Prodigal Son
by The Lady Frost
Summary: He was supposed to be a legend, he just might be a demon. The prophecy called for the Sons of Sparda..none of them ever imagined there were 3. (artwork is DemonLeon3D)
1. ProdigalSon1

**Prodigal Son**

* * *

**Chapter One:**

**Primordial Ooze**

* * *

**7:16 pm - Abandoned Castle-** **Initium Novum**

* * *

He was supposed to be on vacation.

The crackle of his radio sounded so loud as he emerged into the decrepit foyer. It might have been a beautiful castle once, but what was left was a crumbling ruins. Snow trickled down from the half collapsed roof, peppering his face in flakes of white as he eased forward.

The leather coat he wore barely insulated against the frigid air and he was grateful, beyond words, that he'd chosen to wear wet weather gear beneath it and a thermal. It was likely the only reason hypothermia hadn't taken him the second he'd started trekking up the long stone staircase from the dock below the castle. The damn thing was marooned out in the middle of the murky water.

It was cut off, mired, kept away from the rest of the world that waited back on dry land. Once, it had likely stood as a great fortress to protect those that lived within in, but those days were long past now. All that remained of those times gone by was the suggestion of a tapestry stilling clinging haphazardly to one moldy wall.

His light bobbed as he moved, bouncing over the staircase that curled up into the darkness above him. The left side of the staircase was completely collapsed, offering no hope of heading that way. The right side had an archway still standing and a once great dining room now buried in snow. He could still make out the fireplace tucked beside the enormous table that had somehow withstood collapse despite Mother Nature's most voracious attempts to destroy it.

With little choice, he stepped through the small bank of snow gathered at the base of the stairs and moved upward into the dark. As his light guided his way, his radio crackled again and a familiar voice filled his ear, "How's it going, Leon?"

With a light chuckle, he shook his head, "My balls are freezing. My face feels like I had too much Botox and I'm afraid to piss because it might come out in ice crystals. But otherwise? Peachy."

Hunnigan didn't even laugh. She was known for having a stick up her ass on a good day. He was constantly trying to shake it loose.

When she said nothing for a long moment, Leon finally added, "It's mostly derelict. The landscape isn't favorable for passage. I barely docked the boat and found footing to climb up here. You're sure the call said this castle?"

"Yes,"Replied Hunnigan staunchly, "The outskirts of Initium Novum. There's only one castle in that region. Apparently, it was suspected of being used for witchcraft in the fifteenth century."

"...great." The sarcasm dripped from his lips as he rounded the top of the stairs and avoided falling through a huge hole where they'd chunked away into the darkness, "Super. Should I be on the lookout for big nose broads on broomsticks then?"

Again, he could nearly _hear _Hunnigan roll her eyes, "Focus on the mission, Agent Kennedy. The call said the disturbance was supernatural in context. You want the local police to show up there to inspect? We both know what happens to regular people in castles where potential monsters lurk."

He sighed, audibly, "You think I'm any better? I should be on a beach with a willing woman in a tiny bikini bringing me mai tais, Hunnigan. When am I ever gonna get to finish a furlough?"

"When the time is available, Agent Kennedy. USSTRATCOM reserves the right to recall Agents from furlough to active duty in the event of threat to land and pe-"

"Save the speech, kid. You sound like a talking head for the company. I got it. I'll let you know when I find anything."

He clicked off with a roll of his eyes and muttered, "...women."

Hunnigan was a company man through and through. She was always selling him that shit they fed her at board meetings and in office. He wasn't entirely sure why he was still working for the government. It had started after Raccoon, but surely he'd served his masters well enough at this point to be granted a reprieve. Why didn't he just branch out and go freelance?

He was sure the BSAA would take him if he offered. Although the idea of working for Chris Redfield was nearly as pride swallowing as being a government lapdog. He was practically choking on the impotence that would come with it.

Amused, Leon turned the corner at the top and the light bobble over the totally collapsed second floor. There was almost, literally, _nothing _here. What had he expected? That hoards of the undead might come at him and offer some credence to the anonymous tip that had gotten him out of bed at the crack of dawn, on a plane from the beautiful beaches of the middle of nowhere, and tossed into a wasteland of white nightmare where it was so cold that has balls had crawled up his own ass for warmth?

After all, personal misery and risk to life and limb with zero reward was the story of his life.

Leon almost turned back to head back to his boat when he heard a rustling sound. At first, it sounded like the chittering of bugs like the time he'd seen the buzz emerge from the head of that thing in Raccoon City. But this...it was different somehow.

Because the chittering was joined by a moaning sigh.

Leon froze and his gun turned into the dark while his light joined it. He shined it down the sloping demise of the second floor to find it had created almost a slide into the waiting beyond. Something was down there in the black moaning.

Common sense told him to turn around and toss a grenade into the dark...but what if it was a person needing help?

What if it was simply that a couple of stupid teens had been farting around in the castle and gotten themselves hurt? Were there some horny lovebirds at the bottom of the crumbling rock walkway needing a hand out of the dark? Is that what he was here for?

Leon eased down the slide, losing traction as he went, but managing not to go onto his butt like a kid having a great time at the park. The darkness swallowed him whole as he went, leaving just his little light as the only break to the black. He reached the bottom with a clunk and clatter of rolling stones and heard someone breathing sharp, fast, and shallow.

As he turned, looking for the source, it actually took him a handful of seconds to realize it was him. He was breathing like a scared kid. Forcing himself to swallow slower, even, breaths Leon eased into the swirling dark. It was the absolute lack of light that was terrifying him. There was nothing good, ever, in this kind of total lack of illumination.

His boots were the only constant sound. His breathing was the only echo. His breath puffed white and pretty in a cloud out of his frozen lips.

And the giggling started.

He stopped and nearly gagged on the vomit that tried to rise up. Fear. He was choking on fear. After all this time, he could still be scared shitless. It was almost academically interesting.

Something skittered ahead of him. He heard the slap of feet. Leon shined the light into the dark and called, "I don't wanna play your reindeer games, whatever you are. Let's just do this thing, alright? I have theater tickets. I hate to miss the opening previews."

The dark actually seemed to _breathe _around him before it answered, "..._it's hard to see without eyes."_

Aloud, Leon called back, "So off with the panties, huh? You're just gonna start with the threats before you buy me dinner? Some people have no manners."

And the voice returned, "..._some people have so **soulllllsss.."**_

Superb. A creepy soul eating turd of a monster. Those were seldom good for business. When the dark trembled, Leon shot blindly into it. It shrieked in pain, something snaked around his foot and he was jerked off them before he could blink. It dragged him roughly along the broken floor. His jacket ripped, his leg protested the speed and before he could fight back, the tentacle wrapped around his ankle just tossed him like a hand grenade.

Up, over, and flipped into the darkness, Leon had a moment to brace as his back smashed into a crumbling part of the castle and took it with him as he went right on through it. It collapsed in a roar of rushing stone, Leon flipped twice through the debris, and skidded on his side through the dark until he stopped.

His body throbbed like a wound. He rolled his neck and groaned. But he didn't think anything was broken.

Aloud, he lamented, "..._ouuuuuch_. That was unpleasant."

The crackling giggling followed him and flittered around his head like birds in a bad cartoon. "..._not human...not real...monster...not mortal...not man...man but...**demon..."**_

Who?

The missing link in the dark kicking his ass?

Leon grunted as he gained his feet, stumbling once. The bad news was that he'd lost his gun somewhere in the ensuing tossing of the caber that had gone before. He'd kept his light though, for all the good that would do him. So, Leon tugged the knife from the front of his vest and parried..._nothing. _He parried nothing.

Because he couldn't see shit anyway.

He questioned, "You wanna fight like a girl some more and keeping slapping me around? Or you wanna stop wasting my time and come at me?"

The slap to his side was probably deserved that time. After all, he was taunting something big enough to launch a full grown man like a kid tossing a baseball. He managed to get a swipe at it before he was knocked over, rolled to his back, and raked the blade of his big knife down the tentacle that tried to encircle his throat in a hug gone wrong.

The scream was high pitched and painful to his ears. Leon recoiled against the noise, gritting his teeth around the pain in his skull from it. The tentacle whisked away and the twittering giggling around him turned to whispering.

Sibilant, the echoes stirred behind him, above him, adjacent to him.

Leon clamored up again, staggering a little. "Ok. Now this is just getting old. Stop flirting and _fight me!"_

It echoed like thunder. It raced around the dark room and hammered at the shadows. Angry, Leon taunted the dark, "Come on! WHAT ARE YOU WAITING FOR!? An invitation? You want an evite? You need a text message granting permission? Stop fucking around and show yourself!"

The ground beside him made a clack clack of falling rock and a voice answered, "Why not? I was never much for stabbing a man in the back anyway."

Leon whipped the light around, his knife jerked up out of habit, the bobbling yellow blaze hit the face of his attacker as steel kissed steel in a metallic cry of battle. The blades sparked. The light wavered. And two pairs of the same eyes stared at each other in horror.

His attacker backed off and Leon stumbled two steps away. He waved the light on a face that was too familiar. Why? He'd been looking into it all his life.

The other man spat, "What the hell is this shit? Another doppelganger?"

Another?

Was there more than one?

Leon returned, "You tell me...you a clone? They hatch you out of an age? They could have at least given you a better wardrobe. Who wears that kind of crap? Didn't anyone tell you that the _Matrix _sucks?"

"That's rich coming from a guy dressed like a bad video game character."

"Takes one to know one. By the way Lestat, where's Louis?"

His attacker was garbed in a red duster over black pants and boots. As he shifted, Leon realized the pants were black leather. They made a wet sound as the two men circled each other.

Curious, Leon shined the light right in his face and the other man spat, "Get that shit outta my eyes, you knock off, before I feed it to you."

Leon laughed and taunted, "Give it your best shot, I'll shove it up your ass and watch the light shine outta your mouth."

The other man paused, head tilted. He looked curious now and the light passed over his hair. Blonde? No. Leon squinted, he wasn't blonde, his hair was the shocking silver white of the snow around their feet.

The other man returned, "You're the first one I've faced that sounds like me, so I guess they're getting better."

Leon arched his brow, "Yeah? Who're they? Umbrella?"

The man laughed and it echoed. It also sounded suspiciously like Leon's. "What? Who made you? Mundus?"

"Who?"

They stared at each other. Finally, the other man said, "Enough of this. I'm tired of talking to myself. And even more tired of staring at your bad dye job. Blonde don't work if its out of a bottle, dude. Seriously."

Leon snorted and retorted, "Better than looking like the ugly albino version of me. You get uncomfortable in sunlight, big guy? That why you're hiding in the dark like a mole?"

No more fun time, apparently, as the man in red executed some kind of spin kick in the air that was impressive, snake quick, and sent Leon to his butt on the floor. He got his wrists up in a half block, the guy open handed jabbed him in the solar plexus, and Leon was shoved across the floor - breathless- like he'd been kicked by a horse.

Aloud, the other man chortled, "What? That it? You telling me you're a fucking demon without powers?!"

Apparently.

And then? The guy added, "Alright. Have it your way. We'll fight like mortals. Ready?"

Was that rhetorical?

He swung a hook and Leon kicked him in the knee. The other guy slapped his face and Leon grabbed the front of his black shirt, rolled to his back, stuck his feet in his belly and threw him up and out.

He heard the man in red roll to his feet and laugh, "Not bad. Still weak, but I like a challenge. You want me to tie one arm behind my back?"

Arrogant prick. Enough was enough of playing nice. Tauntingly, the man queried, "Is that a no?"

Leon rushed him, ran up the broken column beside him, spun out and kicked him in clean in the face. Blood splattered, Leon hit his feet, rolled across the floor and came up with his knife raised to block the swing of the other guy.

Their weapons clashed. The guy in the duster had an _enormous _sword. The damn thing looked like someone out a comic book had handed it to him and said, "Kill some shit, ok?" It had an angry looking hilt as wide as a his outstretched hand and a blade that was nearly as long as a man.

How the hell did he wield a sword that size?

The blade struck Leon's knife and shattered it. The pieces zipped off into the darkness as Leon rolled, missed losing his head, and kicked his foot out. Boom, he thought as it landed, groin shot.

The other guy grunted, made a gagging sound, and staggered away. Before he could turn back, Leon kicked him from the ground in the ass and grabbed for the sword. He wrenched it, the guy turned to fight him, and Leon punched him in the dick. No thinking, just reaction, he punched him right in his already throbbing family jewels.

The sword tumbled out of his grip as the other man stumbled back and grabbed for his junk. Leon grabbed it and rose and his arms screamed under the weight. What kind of fucking metal was this thing made out of!?

He could barely lift it as he taunted, "See? Who's the clone!?"

Leon raised the sword above his head and brought it down on the hunched back of the man in red. The giggling filled their ears as it struck. It cleaved hard into that leather clad shoulder. The man sprayed blood like a fountain and went to one knee. Leon let go of the hilt and stumbled back and the voices hissed, "_...not human...not mortal...not man...demon...demon...DEMON..."_

Angry, Leon shouted, "Who is a demon!? WHO!?"

And the voices answered, "..._youuuuu..."_

Annoyed, Leon started to answer, and something horrible happened. The man he'd nearly split in half reached a hand over his shoulder and grabbed for his sword. Horrified, Leon swung his light around looking for his gun. The sword squelched, the man grunted in pain, and he tugged his blade out of his own destroyed back. There was a slurping sound as he used the sword to boost himself up.

He turned toward Leon, pointed at him, and panted, "That _hurt, _you ugly jackass. I'm going to enjoy killing you."

Not human indeed.

Leon spotted his gun under a pile of rocks just behind his opponent and wondered, "Yeah? How's the balls?"

"They're gonna feel a lot better when slap you to death with them."

Well that was both gross and alarming, but somehow funny. They both laughed. It echoed. It was the _same _even down to the last snort. Both of them stared at each other in some kind awkward silence.

Finally, Leon mused, "Any time now. I'd like to finish making you a eunuch. You sing soprano?"

The man in red charged him, Leon rolled seconds before he lost his arm to the upswing of that horrible blade, and he dove for the gun.

The darkness giggled as he skidded out of the roll and grabbed the hilt of his gun. He spun up from one knee and the echo of another cracked like a bone into the whispering dark. Had he fired?

The pain hit him after a fleeting second. His free hand slapped over his chest.

Nope. Not him.

The other guy had a gun too.

The light bobbled as Leon tried to stop his chest from spurting all over him. He gasped and blood bubbled out of his mouth. Fantastic, a nicked lung at the least. His gun went off, the other guy ducked to avoid being shot, and Leon rolled away to get to his feet.

He spit blood on the ground as they both found cover.

Into the dark, the other guy called, "How's that lung, guy? Collapsed yet?"

Leon leaned against the shattered wall for cover and tried to breathe. Bad. It was bad. He wiped away the blood that spilled out of his mouth. Bad. Aloud, he returned, "What lung? You missed, you idiot. You're as blind as you are stupid."

He listened to the footsteps of the other man. He closed his eyes and stopped letting them mislead him. When the steps paused, he leaned out of hiding, fired, and leaned back. Thunk. _Gasp. _

And the other guy cursed.

Leon laughed, "See? _That's _how you shoot someone."

"You shot me right in the ass! You an ass man? You certainly smell like it."

Leon tracked the sounds of him again, ignoring his taunts. He waited, spitting blood again onto the ground. So far, his lung hadn't collapsed, so it wasn't as bad as he'd first thought. The sounds stopped, Leon started to lean out again, and a voice next to his ear hissed, "...boo."

Something slapped his face, twice, and Leon rolled away from his hiding place. He ducked and ran, as quietly as he could, but sound was still sound. And his opponent wasn't a rookie here.

As he slid to a stop, Leon swung his light around. It bobbled into the dark, searching for the other man. It passed through murky shadows and landed, too late, on that shock of white blonde hair.

This time, it was the man's voice in his ear that cooed, "...jackpot."

Leon fired for all the good it would do. The enormous sword went straight into his back with a crunch of bone and a wet pop of blood. It exploded out his stomach and tossed red around them like a splatter from a hose. Spitted on it like a butterfly, Leon tried to decide why he hadn't stayed on that beach.

He slumped to the side like a broken doll. His hands dropped the gun with a clatter. And his legs went numb.

Almost instantly. Numb.

Easy enough to figure out why: his evil clone had severed his spine.

In his ear, the clone said, "They should have at least given you a sword. What kind of idiot faces off against demons with just a handgun?"

Demons?

Unable to speak, Leon couldn't stop him from kicking the back of one knee to spill him to the floor. The man in red put his boot against Leon's shoulder and jerked. The blade ripped free of his back - another splash of red on the snow, another shower of it over them as Leon collapsed to his face by a broken pillar.

Above him, the man informed him, "Never bring a gun to a sword fight, rookie. Next time they need to train you better before they let you off your leash."

Rookie. He'd been that once. He wasn't now. Now? Now he was the guy dying in the dirty snow.

Leon coughed once, shivering as the cold finally leached away the last of the feeling from his fingers. His mouth bubbled blood like a fish making - _ploop ploop ploop _sounds. The man in red stepped away and left him where he lay.

His light circled twice on the ground and finally showed the boots of his killer as they crossed through the darkness seeking, no doubt, the sounds of the thing that was playing with them both.

The light found just a suggestion of cloven fee, just a whisper of feathers in flaming red and brilliant blue, just a shimmer of horns over heads that might have been animals. Leon's eyes flickered. His lids trembled. He heard the clash of steel and the shout of battle.

The darkness hissed around him, promising, "..._not human...not mortal...demon..."_

The world flashed bright and white. The man in red shouted in rage. The sword he'd carried whipped over and struck, strumming where it landed an inch from Leon's left cheek. There was a gurgle and a roar of voices, _"...son of sparda...seek your truth...stop the shadows...find...your brother..."_

What? His eyes closed. His breath blew blood soaked snow around him.

Leon let the madness chase him into oblivion.

* * *

_The fire ate along the wall in a rush of red and yellow. It devoured the door frame. He was so scared. He could taste lead in his mouth. The house was ablaze behind them as they ran to the waters edge._

_She poked him onto the makeshift raft and into the arms of the man in the cloak that waited. Her desperate face was pale in the moonlight, "Hurry. Hurry. Take him. Please."_

_The cloaked man clutched him to his chest, wrapped in the warm blanket against the chill. "You could come with us."_

_"...I can't. I can't. I have to go back. My other boys...I have to go back for them."_

_"...you won't make it out alive."_

_She looked at the bundle against his chest and touched the silvery hair poking out. "I know. Tell him...to look for his brothers in the place where the shadows whisper."_

_The cloaked man nodded, his face lost inside his hood. "They won't remember?"_

_"No. I've already made sure of that. Do the same for him. __Protect him. And keep him safe until the time comes."_

_"As you command."_

_She pressed a kiss to the soft hair that peeped from the blanket. "Be safe, my baby. Be happy...Ulysses. (*1)"_

* * *

"-stop, Dante!"

His hands released the throat of the person in front of him. She was pale, her hands bloody from clawing at his. He gasped and slumped to the side. The sword thrust into the ground acted as a brace for him. His hand slipped on the hilt as he tried to breathe.

He avowed, almost growling, on a hoarse echo, "I'm sorry. Jesus."

"What?" The woman he'd been choking gave him an odd look.

And another voice, "It doesn't matter! Get up!"

Around him the dark was shaking like an Earthquake.

The woman he'd been choking grabbed his arm to jerk him to his feet. The one who'd shouted his name threw his other one over her shoulders as the first grabbed the sword and grunted, "I can't get it! Dante! Pull Rebellion free! Hurry!"

His hand curled around the hilt and he jerked, ripping it easily from the stone.

The blonde woman under his arm pulled on him. "Good! Good! RUN!"

They fell into a fierce lopping run. The one he'd been choking had a huge gun on her back as she took the lead. The one holding him up had some rather spectacular cleavage in a tiny leather top. Looking at her tits helped him forget he was so weak.

He had no memory. He couldn't remember. Who was he?

They'd called him Dante. So that part was clear. But what had happened to him?

They tugged him onto the boat at the bottom of the dock and it shot off into the darkness of the turbulent water. It whisked, zipping through the fog as he sagged down in the cold seats. The girl with the big gun was guiding the boat toward the main land.

The one in the leather top cupped the side of his face to turn it up to her. "...you're a mess. What happened down there?"

He didn't know. He shook his head, "...I can't remember."

With sympathy, she nodded. "What are you wearing?"

He didn't know that either. His mind was empty of anything but flashes of fire and smoke. He shrugged and slipped further over. He was going to pass out again, that part was clear.

His eyes skimmed the metal of the tackle box on the seat beside him. It reflected his image back from the foggy, filthy metal. Dante they said. Who was Dante? He didn't know.

Above him, the blonde woman said to the other, "...what happened to his hair?"

The other one glanced at him, "I don't know. Dante? Why is your hair like that?"

He stared at his face for a moment. What was wrong? It was shaggy and kinda wild, sure, but it was also very nice shade of blonde. It looked pretty good paired with the brown leather bomb coat he was wearing.

As far as he could tell there might not be a memory in his head, but at least his head was attached to a body with a good sense of style.

"Why is it that ugly color?"

Ugly. He gave the dark haired one who insulted him a hard look before he slumped his head into the seat weakly. Ugly? What a bitch. Yelling at him, calling him ugly, letting him choke her before slapping him.

His head slid against the leg of the blonde one. He nodded and slid his hand around her calve to hold on as the boat caught waves and jerked him around. She stroked his hair and said, softly, "It's ok, Dante. We'll figure it out. I promise."

One insulting him, one cooing to him - and no memory of either , he whispered, "...women."

And let the darkness take him again.

* * *

**Post Note: (*1) ****Ulysses - The great hero of the Homeric epics the Iliad and the Odyssey. Ulysses was a bold and cunning man who is now imprisoned in the Eighth Pouch of the Eighth Circle of Hell among those guilty of Spiritual Theft. -Spark Notes**


	2. ProdigalSon2

**A/N: **_Plot building. Sometimes it makes us eager for what comes next. _

* * *

**Prodigal Son**

* * *

**Chapter Two:**

**Pieces **

* * *

**11:45 pm - Devil May Cry**

* * *

"-I'm telling you, it's not him."

"Why? Because of his hair?"

"Really? It's more than his hair. What's that damn watch on his wrist, Trish? I'm not crazy right? Dante never wears watches. And that thing? It gives me the heebiejeebies."

"...that's your basis of distrust here? A watch? Lady...I'm a little embarrassed for you."

His arm wiggled and nearly tugged him from the dark.

"There. Watch removed. See? Just a watch."

"Don't be a smart ass, Trish. What's the symbol on the face?"

"I don't know. Does it matter?"

"It's not him. Look! Look at the back of his neck."

Soft hands touched the nape of his neck. What was she looking at? The burn scar from when he was a baby? Someone had dropped a cigar on him they said. It left a ring and a warped lump of skin back there. But the finger slid against it again and stayed, trembled, and retreated.

Why couldn't he wake up!?

"See? It's not him. That's a seal right? He has a goddamn seal on his neck."

"...we don't know that." But the soft voiced one didn't so sure anymore.

"Trish...I swear to god."

"That's ironic. Which one?"

"-you lose your fucking mind on that island? That isn't Dante!"

"Then how did he pick up Rebellion!? How?"

"...I don't know."

"Yes, you do, Lady. You do. Dante had it so it would only answer to his blood. But magic is rarely that specific because he didn't say to _him_, Lady. He said his _blood_. He shouldn't have been able to pick it up, let alone wield it. He did both. You saw the carnage. You saw the damage. He killed everything in that room. How? The sword only answers to Dante's blood."

When the silence dragged out, the soft voice finished, "That's right. Because only a son of Sparda could have done it. This isn't Vergil. We both know that. If it's not Dante...then who? Who? Sparda had TWO sons!"

From somewhere outside the fog of his desperately tired brain, another voice joined the chorus of theirs, "Actually...you only **know** about two. Look at that watch again and sit down."

He slipped back into the dark as one of the women started shouting.

* * *

**Somewhere betwixt and between...**

* * *

It was impossible to describe the colors that meshed and made a myriad of light around him. Every time he looked it became another indefinable color on a landscape that was, wasn't, and never would be. Where he was, no mortal man had ever trod here.

Spitted in the dark like a butterfly on a pin, Dante barked, "Hey! HEYYYYY!"

And the darkness answered, "Is that what gay horses eat?" It was followed by snickers and giggling.

What kind of circle of hell was this that made lame jokes at him?

"As much as I love cheery banter, I was kinda hoping we might talk some shop here. I can't be hanging around all day."

Ok. Ok, seriously? He hadn't meant to pun. He really hadn't. What the hell was wrong with him? He didn't even sound like himself. That battle in the dark with his doppelganger must have scrambled his brains.

From the shadows, a hissing voice cooed, "..._not doppelganger...blood..."_

Right.

Blood.

It was bad enough that the moment Dante had crossed into that damn castle, something had seen fit to nerf the hell out of him. He was suddenly a squishy version of himself. The moment he'd picked a fight with his ugly twin, he'd felt...mortal. He'd felt his heart. He'd felt his blood beating in his veins. He'd felt the ashy taste of fear for the first time since he'd awakened.

He'd tried to prove himself wrong and fallen in mid flip. Like a mortal man trying to copy a martial arts flick or something. He'd fallen to the floor and wrenched his shoulder. It ached as he rose. It ached as he walked.

He was _hurt _and it wasn't healing.

When his doppelganger had started attacking him, the surge of adrenaline had given him enough zeal to fight back with style and flourish, but running at a wattage so weak it was like a flickering light bulb about to go out. He'd been _thrilled _to save face and offer the chance to fight as men.

But even then...even that...he was _weakening. _The more they fought, the weaker he'd gotten until he could hardly hold his feet let alone fight back. Whatever was in the dark killing him had given him the only edge to win.

The sword had gone through flesh and bone. The doppelganger had fallen. But stabbing him had just about taken everything Dante had.

The moment he'd risen up to lop his ridiculous head off his body, he'd seen the goddamn seal on his neck. What did it mean? It was the same seal he'd found on Rebellion while he was cleaning it. It was clearly his mother's seal.

What did that mean?

And the voices giggled, "..._you know what it means...blood...brother..."_

Aloud, Dante sighed, "Shut up. You sound like a bad jap anime character."

From the twisting nothing that was everything, the most beautiful creature ever created emerged. Stunned speechless, Dante could only stare as she stepped toward him. She was all lust and lingering feminine grace. She was swirling dark skin and haunting endless pools of green eyes. She wore, but wore something, and obscured enough of her exquisite bosom to make his mouth water like a ravenous dog.

Her laughter trilled like bells and birds and speared into his groin to give him wood in a way that actually hurt.

Without much hope for it now, he finally found his voice, "...drop the shadows, doll face, and give us the whole show."

She laughed, swirling in spirals of hair that might have been black but winked with stars in flashing bursts of silver. The long curves of her dark fingers drummed against his chest where he was spitted. She played around the wound in his hands like Jesus on the crucifix.

"Does it hurt?" She purred it. She licked her lips. She licked the blood on his wrist and somehow...it actually excited him. Clearly, he was in hell.

"You kiddin? I crucify myself sometimes, keeps a guy young, bleeds out the demons...so to speak."

She leaned up and the shadows and fog and light swirled around and smelled of heavy herbs and incense. Up close, her hair curled up around that gorgeous face like horns of a stage, or when she shifted, horns of a ram, horns of steer, horns of a buck. Never the same, ever changing.

She slid up his body as if she were rising on a wave until they were even. Her fingers touched at his hair and mouth, "...Dante. You're good at hiding. Where have you been all my life?"

And she laughed.

She laughed so beautifully. It made him yearn for her. He wanted to kiss her and hold her and kneel at her feet and wor-

"Oh, _hell _no!" He wasn't playing this game at all. He'd be damned if he'd hang here and let her use woowoo tricks on him.

His head struck first. He head butted her so hard it cracked like a gun shot in the swirling air. The voices screamed and scattered like mice into the darkness. She hissed and a forked tongue stroke down his forehead to gather the blood that slid into one eye. He'd hit her so damn hard he'd broken his own skin.

"...you taste like him."

Curious, Dante laughed, "Quit the games, honey. Either drop to your knees or get lost. I don't have time for pillow talk."

Amusement sparkled around her. She was so happy. He could feel how happy she was. It was like joy injected right into his veins. She pressed a kiss to his chin and swirled away from him. The second she was out of his radius, he could breathe again.

Bitch. She had some kind of power.

She told him, "I tried to stop him, you know."

Dante cleared his throat and blinked away the blood in his eye, "Who?"

She smiled at him. From the air, she conjured a goblet of glowing blood. She lifted it to her lips to sip. "Sparda. He was always the most...altruistic of us. Even though in his prime, he was also the most lethal. He would cleave and kill and rape and burn like those of us he would later call hedonistic."

She laughed and studied him before adding, "You have his look. Though less, it seems, than your brother. There's much of your bitch of a mother in your face."

The slap of loyalty burst out of his mouth before he could stop it, "You don't talk about her. Ever."

Amused, the demon studied him, "A curious thing to have his love for her as well. He abandoned an entire kingdom to be her dying meatsack." The demon shivered with disgust, "I'll never under his need to serve at the knee of a rotting mortal shell."

Dante laughed angrily, "Love is usually an alien concept to the terminally stupid. Haven't you devils figured it out yet? The good guys always win."

She tilted her head, enjoying him, "Do they? Do you consider yourself good, Dante? Are you a hero?"

He tried to shrug, winced at the pain of two dislocated shoulders, and answered, "I'm just a guy with a gift for gab and getting rid of pains in the ass. You wanna cut me loose and get this over with?"

She swirled toward him. She tipped the cup toward his lips. He spat at her and tried for another head butt.

So she threw the blood all over his face.

With a stir of hissing echoes in her voice, she informed him, "You couldn't defeat me, we both knew that. So you surrendered. Why?"

He said nothing, glaring at her as the blood poured down his face. She slapped him so hard his neck cracked. Grunting, he rolled it back forward, "You think pain makes me talk? You were doing better with the schmoozing, honey. Stick a hand in my pants and try again."

She leaned in until their noses touched and drawled, "I am Lilith. I had your father once before he became nothing and threw away everything. He betrayed me. He abandoned me. I'll destroy everything he loved and use his blood to stake my claim to the throne he once swore to protect. You will serve me, or I will make you no better than the bitch that whelped you."

Flashing his teeth in the red of the blood, he growled, "You and what army?"

Against his mouth, she cooed, "The one I make out of your family."

She was sadly mistaken if she thought Vergil would just skip along to serve her. Vergil, as far as Dante was concerned, served only Vergil. His blatant distaste for humanity aside, Vergil was almost always seeking power to propel himself to something greater than his father had left them. He wanted to be Sparda, before Sparda had awakened to his own humanity.

What if this bitch offered him the power to do just that? Would Vergil give her allegiance if she granted him the throne next to her?

Maybe. The idea was more alarming than annoying at this point because she'd muffled him in that castle. She'd muffled him and reduced him to a stumbling, bleeding, fearful human. If she let Vergil loose without someone to stop him...

The idea was devastating. The damage would be catastrophic.

He'd tossed Rebellion before she'd taken him. He was praying that the man with his face and his mother's hair was more than just a crack in some kind of parallel dimension. He was hoping against hope that Eva had sealed away another brother he'd couldn't remember.

Because right now? That ugly blonde carbon copy might be the world's only hope. Here was hoping he was better at being a hero than tossing insults. He had to stall. He had to stall this bitch and give his instincts time to prove right here.

There was only one way to do that: Play along.

So he said, on a smirk, "No reason to get nasty, princess. I'll play your game. But it'll be my rules."

Curious, the demon tilted her head, "What rules?"

"First things first...you got any pizza?"

* * *

**2:11 a.m. - Devil May Cry**

* * *

She didn't really have to disrobe him to check for injuries, but she was curious about his body compared to Dante's. Was it identical? If what Morrison had told them was true, the possibility that Eva had given birth to triplets instead of twins was what they were facing here.

Without knowing for sure, the evidence to confirm it was glaring her in the face.

Trish was, always, dealing with the birth of new feelings. From her first moment of regret and remorse to the moment she'd known amusement, to the second she'd processed respect - everything she felt was new to her. She was still playing around with what it meant to be a woman.

Her hands stroked soap and warm water over his naked back.

He was in an almost rigorous physical condition. Dante was naturally made that way, good genes, and careful grooming; his body was honed in fighting and survival. The one in the tub looked like he worked out to maintain himself. She was betting he didn't chow down on pizza and whiskey like they were the only sustenance around. Her hand tucked the soap against his chest with curiosity.

He had a trickle of scars there on his flesh that reminded her he was supposedly more human than his brothers. He had to be human - once. Demons didn't scar. Her fingers touched against the faded shiny circle above his left pectoral. There was no exit wound but it was clearly a bullet. Did he still have it in his body?

Her thumb traced against this cheek and the smooth slash scar there. Small, nearly unnoticeable with a weeks worth of whiskers on his cheeks, but there. Someone had cut him across the face. The face itself was Dante's, there was no getting around that but again...it wasn't jarring.

She didn't see Dante when she looked at him.

Her finger trailed over the little cleft in his chin. That was Eva's. It was something in the photograph in Dante's room that you didn't forget. It was one thing that Mundus hadn't given Trish, that cleft. It was so important, in some ways, because it was a genetic marker. One parent had to have the gene to pass it on.

Unlike feelings. Feelings were still alien in some ways to her. She wasn't good at identifying them like she'd wanted. Faces and scars were simple. Feelings were a mess.

She'd seen the way Lady looked at Dante. There was a sizzle there, a spark, a surge of something undefinable. When Dante had caught her chewing a pencil and staring at Lady one day, he'd asked, "What's the face?"

And she'd told him, "I'm curious what this look means."

"What look?"

She'd shown him the limpid eyes and soft face that Lady had when he wasn't looking. With a laugh, he told her, "I'd say that's the look of love, doll face. They call that yearning. Where'd you see that?"

Unwilling to sell her comrade down the river, Trish had told him, "On a movie somewhere. Where have you?"

And he answered, "In my nightmares. Clearly. Love is for storybooks and wimps. I don't have time for shit like that."

Yet she knew, they all knew, that Dante still held an almost painful love in his heart for Eva. His mother was probably the only woman he would ever give his love to freely. She must have been a wonderful mother to have earned such unflagging devotion. But the kind of love that made babies and marriages and soul mates? He seemed unwilling to even court the concept.

The look of love. What did that mean? That Lady loved Dante? It seemed likely. It wasn't surprising. He was a notorious and licentious flirt. He was always hitting on her. But it was harmless on his end because he hit on everything in a skirt.

He teased Lady and gave her a hard time as much as he flirted.

What kind of love was it that left a woman gazing at a man with such...she didn't know the word here. What had Dante said? Yearning. What was yearning?

Feelings always left her feeling less and less like a real woman. It reminded her that she was a puppet. Would she always be? The thought brought about something she wanted to call sorrow. It made her eyes tear a little.

Trish skimmed her fingers over the eyebrow of the man in the tub to wipe away the blood. He'd killed everything in the dark under that castle. Or had Dante before something had taken him? It was impossible to know.

But they'd emerged to see the swirl of battle. They'd heard him roar. They'd come upon the final slash of his blade to see him fall to the ground in silence. His Devil Trigger. His power. It was in him.

Whoever he was, he bore too many coincidences to be no one. Morrison made it clear he was to be protected until they could find out the why of it. But where was Dante? How was Dante missing? What had happened in the dark before they'd gotten there?

He had Dante's face. He had Dante's sword. He had Dante's blood. But where was Dante?

Trish soaped over his left thigh and hip and murmured, "Who are you?"

To her surprise, he answered her in a gruff undertone, "I'm the guy whose junk you're washing."

She wasn't. She really wasn't. But it did likely look that way from how he was angled in the tub. She leaned back to look at his face. His blood shot eyes held hers. They were Dante's eyes but they weren't. They were bluer, bolder, shot through with streaks of gold and gray. What was the color? Sea foam?

Aloud, Trish told him, "Beautiful."

Curious, Leon's brows arched, "Thanks. You're not hard on the eyes either. You wanna tell me why I'm naked in a tub?"

"You were hurt. We found you, brought you back here. Who are you?"

Leon grunted and groaned, shifting to sit up as Trish leaned back and helped him. "I know who I am. Who the hell are you?"

"Trish." She studied him as he shoved the hair back out of his face.

"Trish," He mimicked her empty tone, "That's it? Like Madonna?"

"Who?"

Shaking his head, Leon inquired, "You wanna hand me a towel or something here, sweetheart? I don't usually show my twig and berries to women I just met."

Nodding rapidly, Trish moved to grab the towel off the sink beside her and handed it to him. He grunted, "Thanks," and rose to wrap it around his middle. "Trish...thanks for saving me. Seriously. But where the hell am I?"

Trish rose offer him a hand as he stepped out of the tub. He looked annoyed at the offer and shook his head. But he stumbled when he tried and she had to rush forward to catch him against her to keep him upright.

Leon hissed, angry at his weakness, "What happened to me?"

"I don't know." Feeling something like sympathy in her, Trish eased him to sit on the closed toilet. She wet a washcloth to drape over the back of his neck, "What do you remember?"

"Not much. I was fighting some guy in a bad coat. I woke up here."

Trish pursed her lips, "Dante."

Leon glanced up at her and winced, "Right. Dante. The guy with the big ass sword...I should be dead here, Trish. He severed my fucking spine. Why am I not dead?"

With a sigh, Trish gestured at the sword propped against the wall, "That's Rebellion. That's Dante's sword. When we found you, you were using it. You were...I don't know how to explain all of this, Mr. Kennedy. I think you should wait until you're a little stronger."

Leon waved that away with a flick of his wrist. "Forget that. Keep talking. And it's Leon. Mr. Kennedy is my father."

His father.

She didn't think his father was who he thought it was.

Trish chewed her lower lip and perched her butt against the counter across from him. "Ok. Why don't we start with what you remember about Dante. He killed you?"

Leon shrugged, "He did. I was face down and dying. He didn't finish me off though, which was odd enough. He went to fight...whatever the hell was down there. Did it kill him?"

"I don't know," She tapped her nails and finally told him, "He's not that easy to kill."

"...I noticed."

"Mr. Kennedy-"

"Again, _Leon._"

"Right. Leon. Why don't you get dressed in those clothes and come out to the living room. Some of this is gonna be hard to hear."

They held gazes until he finally answered, "Alright. But don't look so nervous, Trish. Whatever you have to tell me? I've heard worse, you can bet on that."

She pursed her lips and sighed, shifting away from the counter, "I really, really, realllllly doubt it...Leon. That man you tried to kill? He wasn't just some monster. I'm pretty sure he was your brother."

Leon narrowed his eyes at her, "That's impossible. I don't have a brother."

Trish put a hand against his arm as he swayed. She kept him upright and answered, "If we're right? It means you have two."

She was wrong. She had to be wrong. She had to be. It was impossible. It was stupid. But how else could their faces be almost identical? With a note of concern, he wondered, "How can I have a brother I've never met?"

He swayed again and Trish had to shift closer to him. "Sit down, Leon. Sit down."

"Fuck that. I'm not gonna fall apart here. What do you mean? Who am I?"

"I don't know that part. Not exactly. We're hoping you might have memories you aren't aware of. I need to know where you came from. I need to know how you found the castle. I need to know what happened to Dante. And how you've been hidden from us all this time. There's so many questions. And I don't know how much time we have."

Leon swayed and she had to steady him with an arm around his middle as he grunted, "How am I alive?"

She chewed her lip and answered, "The only way you could have survived what he did to you...is if you aren't human anymore."

"I'm human. I'm only human. I broke my arm in the sixth grade. I had to get stitches in high school. I can be hurt. I'm human."

"Are you? When did you stop getting wounded?"

He was so quiet. Trish crouched down in front of him and he held her gaze with such an angry one of his own, "You stopped right? And you haven't been sick. Have you ever?"

"...I don't know."

"Then you haven't been." She tucked his hair behind his ears to better see his face, "It's ok to be pissed off. If you're Dante's brother, it's not even a surprise if you start wrecking this place in a rage...but it won't help. You should be dead, but you're not. You're tired. You're weak...you would be...if you awakened your devil trigger."

And now he just looked scared, "...I can't understand any of this. What are you saying?"

"I have all the information you can stand. Days and days worth for you to dig through. But the abbreviated version is that your father was a devil. The demon Sparda, who renounced his birthright and fought his way to freedom. He sealed the underworld and his power with it, but it passed onto you. To Dante. To Vergil. It's his legacy. And now yours."

Leon sagged a little and she braced him, placing her hands on his shoulders, "I can't. I can't do anything. I'm not special."

Trish smiled at him, almost sadly, "You can. You did. You probably have your whole life without realizing it. Dante...he must have known. He must have figured it out. He stabbed you like that...to release you. Maybe he knew something down there was going to kill you both. I don't know. But he released your...mortal shell. He opened you up by taking you down."

Leon laughed, dryly, "Almost killing me made me a devil?"

"...no. You were always that. You were just blind. Almost killing you? It jerked by the blinders and helped you see."

He sagged weakly against her. His forehead touched the side of her neck as it settled at her shoulder. "...I'm gonna wake up and find out none of this is true, right? Bad dreams. I can't be a devil. I can't be that. I'm a good guy, Trish. Good guys? They don't turn into monsters."

She felt a strange urge to kiss his forehead. So she did, accepting the strange sensation of wanting to comfort him. She told him, "It's ok now. I've got you. Just rest. When you wake? We'll find the answers, I promise."

He murmured, shivering, "I'm just a man, Trish. Not a devil. Just a man...who is Ulysses?"

"What?"

"Ulysses...she whispered it. She kissed me and said it. I don't know. I can't remember. Do you call me that?"

No. But it was possible that Eva had. So Trish just soothed him with another kiss to his forehead.

Her hand curled around the watch on his wrist. She hadn't taken it off him. She doubted he even realized that he probably never had himself. It mattered. The face of it, the feel of it, it pulsed with power. Mortal? Maybe it was what had made him seem that way to anyone who dared look. But he'd slowed things down in that castle. She'd seen it all go almost still for a handful of seconds when they'd found him.

That wasn't a mortal man. That was a magical one. Quietly, she mused, "Eva...what have you done? How did you keep him so well hidden? Why just him and not his brothers?"

No answers. But she didn't expect any. There was no real way to speak to the dead. The best they could hope was to access his memories. She needed to find Dante. She needed to find whatever had taken him.

But he was simply too weak to help her.

The soft sound of his slipping into sleep made her sigh. He could fight it all he wanted, but she'd seen him in the dark throwing flame around him as he fought. Dante was the red of blood turned flame. Vergil as blue as a supernova. She, herself, was as yellow as fire fresh from a match. But him?

He'd burned the silver white of a star against the velvet black of a cold dark sky.

He might have been a man, but he wasn't only that. Not anymore. Any more then he'd ever been "just Leon Kennedy". Hero or not? He was now a demon. What he did with that would determine if he was destined to be a monster.


	3. ProdigalSon3

**Prodigal Son**

* * *

**Chapter Three:**

**Witch**

* * *

**3:10 a.m. - Devil May Cry**

* * *

The fear tastes like copper.

He could go a hundred years and he'd never forget the flavor of it - dry as the desert and tinged with pennies and salt. He doesn't belong here, he knows that, even as the dream sweeps him further down into whatever lies it tells...or whatever truths it attempts to reveal.

The small boy is laughing happy and loud as the woman in the black and green dresses chases him eagerly around a yard over run with roses and color. When she catches him, he giggles and grabs for her neck in delight. They spin, happily, holding on to each other with a love that permeates the air with its perfection.

The woman turns in the sunshine with the boy clutched to her.

-it's his **face on the boys head.**

* * *

_"-Ulysses?"_

_He twitches in the dark._

_The voice comes again, stronger, "-hear me, son."_

_His mind bats away the complexity of a world where he can't see or smell or taste or feel. It battles back the fear as it tries to find the face of the voice that compels him. With something like a flash of desperation, it tries one more time to rouse him, "-LEON! Remember who you are!"_

_Somehow, his voice echoes through the sibilant shadows back at her, "How!?"_

_"-find me."  
_

_His chest collapses. His heart explodes inside it. He's breathless, weightless, thoughtless and gone...gone...gone._

_There's nothing but silence._

* * *

It would forever be curious to him why he constantly awoke to find himself clutched in the hands of Trish. That was her name, right? Trish? Why was her face etched in his head like a brand?

He was curled against her side with his nose and mouth against her neck. She had one arm looped over his back and the other stroked almost lazily down his arm. There were voices shouting and bickering around him, but she was quiet where she clasped him. He felt the strangest urge to taste her skin behind the ear and the delicate curve of that throat.

Interesting.

What compelled him?

It was a heady mix of something he'd never really felt before - an urge to try her flavor at the same time he felt oddly comforted in her arms. He listened vaguely to the shouting around him and sniffed her skin. His mind flickered once to let him know that was familiar as well.

Why?

How did he know her?

Not just know her...but _know _her. It was visceral. It was something he couldn't describe. He was tired of being weak and lost and trying to find his balance in a world that wasn't his.

One of those voices bellowed, "I said _sit down, Mary! _NOW! Sit down!"

"-you think you can talk to me that way!? And my goddamn mother fucking name is _LADY!"_

Softly, Leon gruffed hoarsely, "...I don't think ladies have mouths like that on them."

Against him, Trish chuckled lightly. She didn't release him as she commented, softly, "I would have to agree. How long have you been awake?"

He didn't bother to shift as he answered, "Not long...what's the dreams about, Trish?"

She laid her cheek against his forehead and mused, "...I don't know. There's always something to them. Here...nothing is ever quite what you think it is."

Great. More woo-woo shit for him to deal with. She was talking about things that weren't real, that couldn't _be _real, and had no place in a world with rules that forbid them. Of course...who was he kidding here? Hadn't he seen things that belonged in horror films and science fiction novels?

Was he really in a place to doubt the strange and unusual?

He answered, "...why can't I stay awake?"

Her lips turned to brush the shell of his ear, "...you're healing..and I think your body is trying to adjust to the change."

The change - like he was a fucking werewolf or something. Was it like that? Did he morph into a werewolf? "...I can't-I just don't know-I'm not in a place to believe some of this."

Her voice was so soothing, "I know...I'm really sorry, but there's no time for you to wrap around it. We have to find Dante. We have to know what happened in that castle. We need to find out why Eva must have made sure you'd stay hidden like this."

"...Eva?" The name echoed. He heard something his head echo back, "_...find me."_

His eyes slid open. The room swirled a little like he was drunk. Trish told him, "Eva was your mother. You are the third, Leon. The third. We always thought...we were sure...we just assumed there were two. One drawn to the dark, one to the light. We just thought - brother versus brother...it made sense. What does it mean that there are three?"

A rich voice answered that question, "It means triumvirate. Most magical properties come in threes, Trish, it's just the way it's always been."

The angry other female snapped, "It's horse shit. I can't be. You know how goddamn long I've been researching Sparta and the history of it? It is _impossible _that Eva hid a third brother. Impossible. She'd have hidden the other two the same. She'd have protected them from all of this. You want us to believe that she sent the third one to _the other side_?"

What the hell did that even mean?

Parallel dimensions or something?

This tangled web was almost too much for him to understand.

The man returned, "I'm saying she ran out of time. She did what she could to seal and protect Vergil and Dante. She had to move quickly. She foresaw things we can't begin to guess at - and she knew that that this one."

Leon felt the man pointing at him as he eased away from Trish to sit up on his own, "This is one was the key."

Angry, Lady bellowed, "To what!?"

Leon opened his eyes as Trish kept a hand on his arm and the man replied, "To everything."

As he started to protest, Leon finally zeroed in on the man talking. There was a long pause before he finally queried, sharply, "Morrison!? What the hell are you doing here?"

Surprised, Trish inquired, "You know him?"

With a smile, Morrison filled the silence, "Of course...who do you think took him from his mother's arms to raise him?"

Surprised, Lady fell silent as Morrison told them, "Yes. I passed him to the family that would love and raise him as their son. I was always in his life. I was always aware his time would come. I knew he had a purpose greater than himself."

Stunned into utter shock, Lady was mum and staring. Trish finally spoke, "...all this time...you knew that Dante and Vergil weren't the only ones?"

Morrison shrugged one thin shoulder, "I was sworn to secrecy. I took an oath. I uphold my oaths."

Finally, Lady demanded, "Why? Why just him? What was she hiding him for?"

Morrison gave her a cold look and returned, "I told you...I uphold my oaths."

Surprised, Trish queried, "You aren't going to tell us why?"

Leon laughed, but it was hollow, "Not even under pain of death. You met this guy? He doesn't narc. He doesn't squeal...and he doesn't back down. He won't tell us a damn thing until he's supposed to."

Trish shook her head. Lady laughed angrily, "Why the hell not!? We're wasting time with this shit! Where is Dante!?"

Quietly, Morrison told them, "Somewhere betwixt and between...safe...for now."

Lady turned away, fuming, Trish helped Leon rise to his feet. He swayed and her arm looped at his waist as she asked, "What do we do now, Morrison? What's the next step?"

Morrison tilted his head and gave them a cool expression. The moments ticked by until he finally instructed, "We need to take him home. We need him to remember. Home is where the heart is."

Lady scoffed. Trish folded her brow in consternation, "What does that mean?"

And it was Leon who spoke again, "...it means the answers we want are somewhere in my past."

Morrison nodded and tilted his head like a dog, "Not just the past, my dear boy, the answers you seek...are somewhere inside of _you."_

In his head, the voice came again - soft, demanding, desperate - "..._find me..."_

It was time to do just that. So, without a seconds hesitation, he told the other man, "...then take me home...and let's see what Mommy and Daddy left behind."

Apparently, he hadn't figured out what everyone else already knew - _he _was what they'd left behind. The question was...why?

* * *

**-it smells like gasoline.**

He can still remember the acrid and cloying taste of it. It lingers in his lungs and mouth. He can swirl his tongue around and catch the finest edge of her perfume. _Her?_ Who is she?

She's Trish, but she isn't Trish.

He touches the gold of her hair and she laugh. She laughs and kisses his palm. Her voice is lilting - and he knows instantly that she's melodious- she can _sing. _"_...call the corners, Lyo. Call them..."_

Ulysses. Lyo. Leo..._LEON._

His hands clutch at the tattoos on his arms. He traces them and her voice shimmers again, "..._call the corners, Lyo, invoke your circle."_

_Invoke your circle._

His hands lift and his skin glows - the white of a star in a sky made of velvet black- a flash of white along the curls and swirls of symbols he doesn't understand. His mind latches, a photographic memory, storing the image of them so the man in the memory of a boy can find the answers to the mystery.

He invokes things he doesn't understand - he sets up a circle of shadow and lightning strikes of power around them in a twisting coil of snakes made of flash and shimmer. He calls to things he's only read in books and learned of through fairy tales. They answer, and the garden is suddenly filled with twinkling lights and smoke. They aren't alone anymore, something is bobbling through the shadows with eyes turned red with hunger.

She tilts her head at it, curious, "..._always they watch, always they wait...your father forbids them entry, the garden and grounds refuse them...but power seeks power, Lyo...only the knowing can resist the unknown."_

The book on the pretty stone altar behind her is bound in flesh and sutured with something green and shiny. It's a Book of Shadows, she tells him and makes him giggle like only a child can as she invites, "..._a sorcerer always keeps his book close, Lyo. It's your thoughts, your dreams, your spells and powers...without it...you're just flesh made false with lies and doubt."_

His mouth asks,, from the body of a boy with the voice of a man, "...I've lost my book."

And she cups his face in her hands to tell him, "_..you haven't...it's waiting right here for you."_

He looks at the garden. He takes in the roses and the lichen and the curling ivy with lavender and lily of the valley. He touches the swirls of pumpkin vines at his ankles and brushes his hands through the skimming kiss of heather.

She crouches in front of him to touch his chest, "_I'm right here. Look inside, Lyo, and find me."_

The world is cold and the garden dies with a hiss of a snake about to strike. The sky chars and coils into dirty clouds and oily light. The world flashes red and gold with orange and flame and fear. She holds his face while the world burns and tells him, "..._find Dante, Leon, find your brother...stop Vergil before he falls...unite, teach them, or the unknown will become more than shadow..."_

The thing in the fire leaps, snarling as a smoking streak of black and burning eyes - fear made flesh that wants his blood. She rises, the woman with the wonderful laugh, and turns like a goddess of battle to stop it. Her arm lifts, it sweeps into the rising wind, and the fear is thrown away to scream with the cry of a thousand voices lost in a circle of hell.

Afraid, his voice asks, "...am I in hell?"

She faces him with the flames flickering in the eyes they share, with fight and courage and beauty in the cleft chin that passed to him from her like the shape of those eyes, "..._not yet...but Dante is..."_

The fire sweeps over his legs, the pain seizes his arms and hands, and leaves a lance of terror in his heart.

He grabs for her hands in desperation - and finds himself in a garden gone ragged with rot and death...

...he knows where to start looking for answers.

* * *

**7 :00 a.m.** \- **Highway 901 toward Red Grave City**

* * *

Lady was sleeping in the passenger seat with the rising sun on her cheeks. Morrison drove, his signature cigar sending curls of smoke out the cracked window beside him. The low brim of his hat kept the light at bay as he angled the SUV into lazy morning traffic.

In the back on the bench seat, Trish shifted her gaze over to find Leon watching her. He'd been sleeping, but he was clearly awake now and unabashedly observing her profile.

The light haloed around his tired face and left it gilded in gold. After a long moment of silence where they continued to stare at each other, his mouth finally quirked. "...we having a stare down?"

Her lips curled up into a smile, "...it would seem that way...you dreamed of her."

Not a question.

She didn't ask question, this woman. She didn't react like a normal woman at all. She didn't coo or flirt. She'd been somehow maternal and somehow asexual with him naked in the bathtub. She shared a face with the woman in his dreams - his mother no doubt- but when he was awake and looking...he didn't see his mother. Maybe that's why he was staring, because she had his mother's face, but she didn't trigger his mother in his memories.

A curious thing.

So he answered, "...I did. She wants me to go to the house...but it burned. Is it gone?"

Trish smiled sadly, "I can't answer that. Dante was...resistant to visiting. There are things about their time there that he won't speak of. He had happiness there, I think, his last real happiness before her death. It pains him."

Leon, sitting sideways on the bench seat with his cheek resting on the smooth fabric, tested his boundaries and lifted his hand. He tucked a curl of blonde hair behind Trish's ear as she spoke. She didn't resist. She shifted a little on the seat toward him to let him.

He liked the feeling of it.

She continued, "There were whispers, of course, that Eva and Sparda had been...liberating devils to join their cause at one time."

Curious, Leon asked, "What cause?"

Nodding, Trish turned to face him completely. Their legs brushed on the seat as she shifted her hand to his knee and his slid against her arm to cup at her wrist and hold. Casual touches, too many, for someone he didn't know. What was the impulse to touch her? Why was it seemingly echoed in her?

She started talking as if he'd asked for all of it - the whole story.

She told of a man, not a monster, who found his mortal self beneath the evil and married a woman with ties to sorcery. She told of a demon named Mundus whose jealousy created a doppelganger of her after having her murdered. She told of Sparda, who was presumed dead but had never been found, and two sons who'd chosen opposite paths to power. She spoke of Dante with an affection that interested him, but there was no undercurrent of romance there.

Not a whiff of attraction.

Wondering about it, he asked, "...can you feel lust?"

With her head tilted, Trish returned, "...I suppose, but lust is often a dark emotion. I'm not sure I'd like to feel it, if it feels anything like anger."

She was a fascinating creature. There was no pretense here, no falsity, no games. She was created to be evil, and had found her way toward the same kind of muted salvation that she praised Dante for. The more she talked, the more he wanted to meet his "brother" to see how alike they might be after all. Their snarky insults had certainly rang with the same brand of sarcastic arrogance.

Amused by her, Leon replied, "Anger and lust are not always alike."

The statement made her mouth twitch, "Not always?"

"Hmm...sometimes anger and lust feed off each other a little, but...dysfunctional women is sort of my thing so..."

He trailed off. Eva studied him and finally asked, "You have a wife?"

"No."

"Children?"

He shook his head in answer to that. "...with what I do, children were never an option for me."

There was a flavor like sorrow in his tone. Intrigued by it, Trish soothed, "...it's not too late. I think...I feel as if...Eva would want you to breed."

To breed. She spoke like he was a mutt making puppies. She was somehow charming when she talked, and somehow missing social cues that might have made her sound less rough. Amused, Leon teased, "You suggest to Dante that he should breed?"

Trish laughed a little as her hand squeezed above his knee, "I did. He was...not receptive."

In the front seat, Morrison joked, "He was a downright dickhead. Never saw a grown man throw such a fit. You'da thought we suggested he lop his damn dick off instead of make babies with it."

Muttering in the passenger seat, Lady added her two cents, "...cause babies are fucking gross. They're useless and stinky. They cry all the time. Who has time for that?"

Beside Leon, Trish confided, "...I might like babies, I think. They are soft and pure."

Leon leaned in a little and suggested, "You ever pretended to make one?"

Her gaze lingered on his face. She tilted her head like a curious dog. He arched a brow and she mused, "...you're a flirt."

She sounded so amused that it made him smile as well. He shrugged as he confided, "It's a defense mechanism. I'm outta my element here and treading water in a sea of shit, I'm just trying to find my balance. When I get nervous, I flirt. You can slap me down if I get out of line."

Lady snickered. Morrison scoffed. Trish replied, "...Dante flirts with everything. It appears to be genetic."

Leon cocked a brow, "...he flirt with you?"

Lady piped, "All the time."

Morrison joked, "...so often I think he should just ask me to marry him and get it over with." Which made Lady laugh and snicker as Trish leaned forward to confess, "...never. Not once. I look like your mother."

Leon leaned forward and quipped, "...Freud says every man alive wants to fuck his mother. You wanna know something?"

Trish tilted her head. "Do I?"

Leon leaned a little more until their noses touched and informed her, "...I don't see his mother when I look at you."

Trish felt her mouth lift and she whispered back, "...she was your mother too."

Leon's shoulder lifted in a shrug, "...I don't feel the same way he does. I can't really remember her. I can pull memories, but it's not the same. I don't see a mother when I look at you, Trish, but I see a woman."

She leaned in closer as he did and his lips aligned beside her ear as he added, "I'm notorious for really bad sexual decisions in the middle of a crisis. You let me know if you want to find out what lusts feels like...I'm happy to pretend like we're making a baby any time you want."

Trish felt the flutter of amusement again. He was Dante's brother after all. The timing was always wrong for Dante's flirtations. He tended to flirt at the most in opportune moments. He'd grabbed Lady's ass post battle once while the body of their victim had still been smoking on the ground between them.

She'd laughed and slapped him for it, but the twinkle of them both had told Trish that it was an enjoyable thing, flirting. She wanted to discover if the rest of it was too. So she answered, quietly, "...what if touching me opens a door in your head to your memories?"

He brushed his lips behind her ear and made her skin tingle as he answered, "Bonus, right? Everybody wins. We find out who I was, we find out where Dante is, and you find some more feelings you've never experienced before. Win...win..."His lips pressed against the pulse below her jaw as he finished, breathily, "...win."

In the front seat, Lady admonished, "Ugh. Stop. Please. Before I barf in my boots. Dante will saw off your dick if you even get it anywhere close to her."

Leon leaned back as Trish did. She wasn't blushing. She wasn't cooing. She wasn't dithering like a girl who enjoyed his overtures. She was just staring at him with interest. He watched the hurt flash on her face at Lady's statement and wondered, "...he blocks you from stuff like that, doesn't he?"

Trish shrugged and turned away to look out into the rising sun.

Morrison answered, surprisingly, "Dante tends to be overprotective of Trish."

Lady added, "Of course he does. She's his mom."

Trish answered, quietly, "I'm not. I'm not his mother."

Lady shrugged, "Sorry, but that don't change what he sees. I know you're just sharing her face, T, but Dante sees her when he looks at you. You think he's gonna want to come back and find out you're tagging his...whatever this guy is here?"

Trish said nothing.

Leon pursed his lips and studied her profile again. He liked the interest in him for her. It had been a long time since a woman he bothered to crack out any feelings in his cold heart. Ada, and she was always one lie away from leaving him at the mercy of a dagger in the heart anyway, but not anyone else in a long time. Was it the simplicity of knowing Trish had once been a puppet and was somehow pure and virginal for it?

Of course it was. I like babies, she's said, they're pure. She was too. She was a murdering demoness, but she was pure somehow. It was refreshing as all hell given the horrors he'd encountered in his life.

Her purity was something he clung to in the face of his world being thrown into upheaval.

That she shared a face with the long dead Eva was irrelevant. He simply understood that it wasn't the same woman, and so he didn't see one when he looked at the other. Some line of jaw or curl of brow differentiated them, and one was the mother he'd lost and one was the woman he wanted.

It was that simple.

When Trish continued to stare out the window with something like remorse on her face, his hand slid over and found hers on the seat. She let him blend their fingers and a smile curled at her mouth as Morrison told them, "We're getting close. You feeling anything at all?"

He was feeling something alright, but it wasn't for Eva. It was just for the woman who was wearing her face. Incestous? Or was it somehow more complex than that? He simply didn't care. It felt good, so he indulged it.

"Hmm...something. Yeah."

The SUV bumped over a gravel road. The watch on his wrist pulsed hard enough that both he and Trish felt it. She turned her head toward him. He arched his brows and his chest started to throb like he'd run a mile.

Quietly, with a shiver of fear, he lamented, "...shit..."

Morrison, soothing him, remarked, "Yeah. It's a seal. She did that long before she died. The only way to cross the seal is with her blood. Mundus broke the seal the night she was murdered. We think her trusted servant bargained for immortality with some of Eva's blood to buy her way into the demon world. It was enough to allow Mundus to break the seal and slaughter her...and enough to create Trish from her remains."

Trish looked so sad that Leon squeezed her hand and answered, "...so let's find out what he couldn't burn...I can tell you this..._something _is here."

He knew that as well as he knew his own name. The feeling of awakening after a long sleep was almost visceral. It flowed through him like blood, making his lips throb as a good kiss might, and putting blood in his groin as if he were about to fuck.

What was it?

As if she'd read his thoughts, Trish told him, "...power."

Damn.

He understood now why men fought and died for it. Power. It was a small word for such a massive feeling. As the SUV rolled to a stop, Leon asked Trish, "...does it feel like this when you-"

He trailed off and she finished, "...awaken your Devil Trigger?"

He nodded and she returned, "...every time."

Quietly, he leaned forward to tell her, "...then you know what lust feels like, Trish. Imagine this...but it just goes on and on and on."

Their eyes held. She finally inhaled sharply and told him, as Morrison and Lady alighted from opposite sides of the SUV, "...let's find what you need...and you can help me do the same."

It was the nicest proposition for sex he'd ever had.

His body hummed with the promise of power and purpose and pussy. A crazy thing, to find power and sex and the soul were all somehow linked after all. He slid out of the seat and felt the cold wind on his face.

His gaze found the charred remains of the place he'd lived, they said, with a demon and a witch.

He wanted them to be wrong. He wanted to deny it. He wanted to stand there and refute the truth.

But he couldn't. Standing in the face of the place that had changed his world forever, he couldn't do anything but accept that he might be Leon Kennedy - but he wasn't ever just a man. He was the lost son of a legendary dark knight and a sorceress. The answers were waiting in that carcass of what he might have been.

He belonged here. He knew it the same way he'd known he couldn't do anything but drive into a dying city and try to save it. He knew it in his bones and his blood and his balls.

The truth flowed through his body like blood and birth right - the prodigal son had come home.


	4. ProdigalSon4

**Prodigal Son**

* * *

**Chapter Four:**

**Awaken**

* * *

**8:10 a.m. Red Grave City**

* * *

The bones of an abandoned homestead offered a pale and tired sky and little to the naked eye. The crunch of dying grass met snow and made a symphony of sounds as he approached. He could hear, vaguely, the drone of conversation from Lady and Morrison. He knew, without looking, that they were discussing Dante and Vergil and what had happened here.

Leon crossed under a sagging redwood, felt a shiver of wind and weird energy, and paused. He lifted his head like he was listening. Trish, beside him, watched his face. He met her eyes and nodded.

Her hand curled around his forearm and she turned. Behind them, Lady and Morrison had fallen quiet. The moment Trish pressed his palm to the bark of that dead tree, his pupils dilated and he felt, impossibly, his conscious separate from his body.

It was as if a spear of light had thrust into his brain and opened his skull like an envelope. What was in rushed out, airborne, looping through the graying dawn in swirls and memories. He could see the world re-knit, drawn from a time when the land on which they stood was whole. _Across the jewel green grass, a beautiful white wolf ran into the sunlight. _

_Behind him, the white blonde hair of three boys gave chase. The first wore red, the second blue, the third garbed in a simple brown like buttery leather. They laughed, tumbling and fighting as boys often will, playfully chasing the wolf that barked and circled to lead them on. The one in red went down first, rolling across the grass._

_When he stopped, the face he turned up to the son was familiar, Leon had faced him in the bowels of that castle after all. It was his brother - Dante._

_The boy in blue had to be Vergil. He had a face with a sharper jaw and leaner cheeks. His hair was longer, lacking the pretty curl of Dante's along the ears, and somehow more severe. He laughed, but it was less enthusiastic. He had the face of a boy who knew joy was temporary._

_The one in brown tackled Dante and they rolled across the grass trading blows. Their laughter was high and happy. The wolf joined them to growl with sheer joy and the three of them just laughed until the first rumble of thunder broke them apart._

_Vergil, looking thoughtful, told them, "You know how he feels about us staying out in the rain."_

_Dante chuckled and shrugged, "He worries too much. The other day, I was down by the creek fishing. I almost caught the big one!"_

_Leon's inner eye shifted to the boy in brown and swirled there. It was his face. It was him -him with his brothers. So young Leon returned, "...liar. You'll never catch the big one!"_

_Dante snorted and rolled his eyes, "I did, you turd breath, I had him on my hook! And then along came the old man to give me a speech about how I needed to stay close to the house. Didn't I know what was out there!? Old man...he's such a killjoy. I told him...if I just kept trying, eventually I'd hit the jackpot, ya know? He doesn't get it."_

_Vergil gave Dante a piting glance, "You worry too much about what he thinks, you always have."_

_Leon chuckled, "He's a brown noser!"_

_Dante flipped the middle finger as Vergil joked, "Can't see it over the shit on your face!"_

_Dante snapped, "You should be familiar with it, Vergil, you always have a stick up yours!"_

_Leon giggled lightly and sighed, "Mom said he knows things about us that he can't say. She says he was this great and fearless leader." They all rolled their eyes at the concept, "He just acts like a big pain in the ass."_

_Dante nodded, "He's a real...turd burglar!"_

_Vergil rolled his eyes, "You two are such babies. You ever think maybe there's more to it than that? Come on...we're home schooled. We never go out. Mom teaches us and we can't ever go beyond the edges of the property. Why? What's out there?"_

_Leon and Dante shared a look. Vergil had a tendency to get a little weird about what was beyond their land sometimes. He did so now, sighing, "There's power out there, ya know? I can feel it."_

_Dante snorted. Leon quipped, "That's your dick, dude, get your hand outcha pants."_

_Dante and Leon laughed. Vergil sighed and turned away. He watched the horizon and remarked, "You'll see...one of these days...I'm gonna be somebody."_

_He started to look pensive so Leon gathered up his hands like he was preparing to pitch on the baseball mound, rolled his neck, and tossed the air. It swirled, struck his brother in the butt like a slap, and made Vergil yip and jump. He spun around and pointed, "Hey! You witch - fight like a man!"_

_They laughed. They charged each other. Their wolf circled with happiness at the battle. Dante counted like a referee on a mat when one went down. _

_The rain came down in soft sprinkles and the wind made a cocoon around them to keep them dry._

_At the house, a familiar voice called, "BOYS! It's time for training!"_

_Sighing, Dante rolled his eyes, "Old man...doesn't he get it? We don't want to fight...we just..."_

_Vergil grumped, "...just want to have fun, right?"_

_Leon heaved out a heavy breath, "...all work and no play...the story of my life."_

_The wolf bobbed her head under his hand. The eyes in the glossy white muzzle were his. He tilted his head, smiling._

_He knew, without the answer in his soul, that the wolf was his mother. _

* * *

Leon inhaled sharply. His hand slid off the tree. He grabbed Trish's hand and pulled. Without words, they started running. The grass absorbed, the wind whipped wildly around them.

She kept pace with him as the joy speared over his face. It was fascinating. He hit the steps of the hallowed out mansion and pounded up them. The interior remained in charred walls and decaying floor. He looked at it like he'd stepped into the finest house on Earth.

In what had once been the foyer, he told her, spinning a little, "She had parties here...grand ones...but the guests...they weren't ever really human. Skin in various shades that made us laugh, a rainbow of flesh as Vergil liked to joke. A kaleidoscope of colors."

He paused at the archway that was still intact by the grand ballroom. His free hand touched the wall and his eyes shivered and closed. He could see them, all of them, dancing and laughing. Magic in the air in a way that was somehow so simple.

He could see _her - Eva. _She gestured with her hand, and his eyes twinkled in her face. The boy in the brown danced with her until the figure in black obscured the light. _Ulysses - it's time to train._

Softly, Leon intoned, "...Sparda."

T_he world narrowed to the handsome face that crossed the sea of memory toward them. Eva, sparkling still, called, "You work too much, John...you should take a moment and dance."_

_Sparda paused, dressed in a beautiful Victorian over coat of luscious velvet. It was dated, but somehow just right, as Eva wore a dress with a bodice that spoke of simpler times. He tilted his head in a gesture that Leon knew was his own._

_"Should I? And who, pretell, protects while the world parties, my love? Perhaps I should enjoy some scotch and a slice of pizza instead of fighting."_

_Dante, drinking soda pop and eating pizza across the room, called with his mouth full, "Yeah, dude! That's what you should do! Dad - just chill out!"_

_Sparda rolled his eyes and invited, "Ulysses...would you like to join Vergil and I on our hunt? Dante has chosen to stay home with your mother and help her garden."_

_Dante grinned and shrugged, "She said she'd make me brownies."_

_Always a sucker for food, Dante was easily bought by Eva's affection. She grinned and squeezed her son, "It's alright, Lyo, you can go with him. Dancing...it's something you can do anywhere. In the middle of the night or a fight or when the world is fractured, you dance...there's power in that."_

_Sparda cupped her face in one hand and kissed her. Affection, it was always pure and open here. It made the boys gag and look disgusted. There was no greater horror to a young boy than his parent's love affair. _

_Dante called, "Ewwww!"_

_When he pulled away, Sparda gave Eva such a long look that her smile wilted at the edges. She lifted both hands to grip his biceps and he nodded. Softly, her tone changed, "...John?"_

_She never called him Sparda. To her, he would always be the name he'd chosen for himself at the sacrifice of a world he'd left behind - John. _

_He told her, urgently, "Listen, my love, and tell me what you hear..."_

_She did, eyes flashing, and her hands seized tight on his arms, "...you have to go."_

_Surprised, he kept hold of her face, "I will **never** leave you."_

_Eva denied this, turning her gaze to Leon where he stood beside her. "I need you to go, John. Now. Please. You know..." She trailed off, "...it matters. If they find you..."_

_Sparda looked stricken. He cupped Leon's face in one hand and shook his head. "...I can't leave you."_

_Dante, across the room, looked a little worried, "Dad? What is it?"_

_Eva kissed her husband again, sadly, "It's time. We always knew it would be time. Go, John, say goodbye to Vergil...you know that matters too...how you go...it matters."_

_He pulled her close, calling, "Dante, come!"_

_The boy ran without question. He threw himself against his father. Leon edged in as well. Vergil, emerging into the ballroom, simply enveloped into the hug. They all held on until Sparda spoke, "...I have to go away for awhile."_

_Vergil protested first, "No! I will come with you!"_

_Sparda released them and knelt. He gripped Vergil's left arm and Dante's right. Leon kept hold of Eva's hand beside them. "Boys...there are things I have to take care of now. There are things...your mother will tell you what she can, but you have to trust that things will go as they are meant to. It was never meant to be forever."_

_Eva shook her head, reiterating, "...never forever...my love..."_

_He kissed the foreheads of Dante and Vergil, warning them, "Love each other, trust each other, help each other...never, ever forsake who you are for what you could be..."_

_He turned his attention to Leon and told him, "...you'll be lost soon. I can't spare you what you must go through. I can't save you from it. You will survive it, my son, and return when your brother's need you the most. You have to protect them, protect your family, protect..." He trailed off as he lost his voice._

_Quietly, Eva told him, "It's too late for that, John. I can't...I can't be-it's too late."_

_His eyes filled as he rose. He let the boys all hug him again and took her face to kiss her. She pressed their foreheads together as he told her, "...you've always been the best of me, my love."_

_Eva, gripping his wrists, told him, "You've always been the best of us all...let me protect them now, they way you've protected us all this time."_

_He peeled the boys off who clung to their mother as he backed up. He told them, "...look to my coming on third day of the longest night...when their is nothing but shadows and silence...look to the place where the light won't touch...love each other...Eva..."_

_She smiled, cheeks wet, "Go. Now."_

_Vergil yelled, desperately, "Dad! Don't go!"_

_Sparda looked at him sadly, "...you are better than what lives inside of you, Vergil...better than what waits beyond you...find your brothers, protect them, and remember who you are...Lyo..."_

_He paused, he listened, and he spoke again, "...Leon...you know who you are...return to the place where the fire purifies...seek the truth inside the sadness...forgive me..."_

_His body erupted, ripping apart in a cry of rending flesh as the flames ate around him and reduced him to the enormous form of jet black and hooves. The boys stood in some kind of transfixed awe as they'd never see his true form before. He rose above them, voice gravely and full of sibilant echoes, "Find the others and release them...release them all..."_

_There was a whomp of pressure and light that blasted out in a wave. The warmth hit in bright bold white and he was gone. Eva, clutching her boys, whispered, "...now is the time...the time..."_

_...the time..._

* * *

He was on his knees with Trish clutching his face. He blinked, shaking, and told her in a rough voice, "...he knew they were coming."

Trish, eyes wide with sympathy, intoned, "...who?"

"...Sparda...he knew they were coming. He left. He left her to protect us and she sent us away to try...he knew...and he left...I can't-" He rose and shook his head, turning away to scan the empty room, "Why would he leave? Why? He should have stayed and fought for her! He should have stayed and protected her! He was a _coward!"_

It echoed around the cold remains of the life he'd had once.

"She could shift...she had the power to shift...why didn't she shift and run!? I don't understand any of this! He left us here to die!"

There was a crunch of sound. Morrison wasn't alone anymore. It wasn't Lady beside him, it was Dante...but it wasn't. Head tilted, Leon queried, "...Vergil?"

The severe face had survived time. It was harsher now, colder, and graced by a shock of white swept back from it. He and Dante shared features, as they all did, but the face wasn't exactly the same - triplets it seemed - but not identical. Vergil's cool voice returned, "...he left us here to rise."

They faced each other across the shell of what had been. Leon snapped, "They erased me and sent me away. They didn't fight! They just gave up! I've spent my life fighting!"

It bounced around the ghost of what was and stirred up pain with each syllable. Vergil nodded, stepping into the shadows and light in an outfit like his father had worn, graced with a blue tie and pretty silver lining. "Yes - I as well. Fighting, it seems, is what we're meant to do. Sons of Sparda, as it were, and men without fail. He favored Dante, as _she _favored you."

The disdain was old, a wound left less healed, "I was but an after thought to them. When he left...I knew the only way to win was to find the power to destroy those who hunted us. He ran and left us. She failed to save us. The world burned and she made sure you...just you...escaped the life we lived in her absence. Without home, without fail...without hope...we made ourselves from the ashes of what they'd left behind."

Leon, angry, spit, "I had no choice! I didn't know! Most of my life, I've had no choice! I just kept fighting...and why? Why? Why now? Why here? What does she want from me!?"

Vergil held his angry gaze, "She wants what she always wanted...for us to join together and fight. She wants us to find him...he's lost...he's waiting...she wants us to band together and find him...first Dante...then him."

Leon shook his head, "I can't. I can't fight like you...and Dante...Dante _destroyed _me back there. I'm good, I'm not _that _good."

Vergil nodded. He sighed. He tugged the sword from his hip with a sing of metal, "You have to awaken...you have to...die..."

Leon tugged his gun, aiming easily as they circled each other. Vergil tilted his head as Leon demanded, "And what? You think I'll just let you run me through for it? You've got to be fucking kidding me."

Vergil shook his head, "Not me...you...you have to do it...it has to be you...where is your sword?"

Leon shook his head, keeping Matilda on his erstwhile demon brother, "I don't have a sword. I never have."

Trish spoke first, "...the gun, Leon...your gun...where did you get it?"

He froze. He glanced at the barrel. His gaze shifted back to his brother and he said nothing. Vergil nodded, "Yes...she disguised his weapon for you in that hedonistic thing. Throw it down, bathe it in your blood, and release it."

Morrison spoke now, softly, "...it is Luce..."

Surprised, Vergil stopped circling, he glanced at the other man, "...where is Ombra?"

Morrison returned, "...waiting..."

Nodding, Vergil instructed his brother, "Release the weapon inside of you...release yourself...throw down your arms and surrender..."

Leon sneered, softly, "I don't surrender, you idiot. Not to you, not to anyone."

Vergil's teeth flashed in a wolfish grin, "Fair enough. Then this is where I make you."

He raced forward, the gun went off four times and struck him twice. He gave Leon a look a surprise and pride and swished the air in a heavy swirling series of rather lovely swordplay.

The cuts were shallow but painful. Leon's arms came up to block it and took the brunt. The gun slid against his bloody palm as Vergil backed him into the wall, thrust the long blade of his weapon through his waiting shoulder, and forced the pistol of Matilda against Leon's sternum. Grunting, Leon spit, "...see? I'm just a fucking man...what do you want from me!?"

They battled for control of the gun until Vergil instructed, "...I want you to die."

He pulled the trigger twice at point blank range. Leon grunted and the blackened wall splattered red with blood. He sagged, the blade keeping his body upright, as his brother cupped the back of his neck to hold onto him. The world went white with pain, his breathing slowed.

Morrison spoke into the ragged silence, "...you better fucking pray you're right...if not? You just murdered the only chance you have at redemption."

Trish shook her head. She spoke above Lady's heavy breathing, "He's not dead...look."

Vergil shifted the gun, he slid Leon's hand over the trigger. The red hot spill of blood steamed in the cold air. Against his brother's ear, Vergil commanded, "Do it...finish it...awaken..."

His forehead sagged against his brother's shoulder. Leon trembled in the pool of his own blood. His voice came, distant and weak, "...fuck my life..."

He pulled the trigger. It took out his heart in a single shot. It opened his chest and obliterated his beating life force. Death was instant. It gushed out of him as his eyes fixed and dilated.

Vergil clutched him in the silence that followed.

It dragged on so long that Lady spoke, "...shit."

Trish shook her head, "...wait..."

Morrison cursed, "...you stupid bastard...you kill him on purppose!? You like to get him to trust you so you could polish him off and get him out of your way?!"

Lady snapped, "You son of a bitch...you play us all for fools!? I'm gonna kick your as-"

Leon's body jerked. He exhaled on a high gasp. His body jerked convulsively as Vergil backed off. The sword in his shoulder was wrenched free and Leon fell forward into his blood with a splash. The gun in his hand trembled, twitching twice like a living thing.

Quietly, Vergil stated, "...it's seeking it's mate."

Morrison nodded, eyes bright, "...makes sense. It needs to be whole. It's awakened, but it's not complete."

Trish, whispering, knelt in the blood to cup Leon's face and remarked, "...and neither is he."

His eyes opened - seafoam rimmed in red. She gripped him in the way his mother had once held Sparda, urging, "It's alright...it's time...awaken."

Time - he was out of it. He'd never had enough. He'd spent his life chasing more time. He was here, now, chasing the promise of a time when he could just...stop fighting. His body was on fire. His soul, somehow, burned in his flesh like flame made blood. The truth turned his skin boiling. His heart started beating fast, healed, hard and loud. They could all _hear _it.

His hands picked up the gun lying in his blood. He turned it on his brother and snarled, "...you stupid son of a bitch...I always knew you'd fight like a bitch..."

It went off and sent Vergil spinning into the wall. Blood flew in a red arc as his brother grunted and slid to the floor, eyes wide. Lady laughed and remarked, "You ever think these damn sons of Sparda can just hug and say I love you? Why is it always done in blood and battle?"

The battle was in Leon's body. It hurt to breathe. It hurt to think. It hurt to gasp or grunt or kneel. He let Trish soothe him as the pain took away the power that beat like fists of rage inside of his skeleton.

Awakening just might kill him.

He threw back his head and his cry of pain echoed into the pouring rain.


	5. ProdigalSon5

**Prodigal Son**

* * *

**Chapter Five:**

**Time**

* * *

**8:40 a.m. Red Grave City**

* * *

"-down!"

Enough of him came back to find Trish atop him, straddling, pinning his arms to the ground. He grunted, shaking where he lay, "...I've had this dream before..."

His voice was hoarse. He was soaked - in sweat? In blood? He couldn't tell. Trish was sweaty and pink with blood herself. She caught his eye and warned, "...it's not a dream...and it's not over...I'm sorry."

She looked it.

The pain tore through his belly. He screamed, body bucking. Lady shouted for help and he knew she was holding his legs. Vergil, the asshole, stood above him looking down like a condescending demi god. He spoke without anything but a whiff of amusement, "Release him...let him come. I would see what he's made of."

Morrison called, "You kiddin!? You'll kill him!"

Vergil shrugged a shoulder, "...if he's one of us, he'll survive his own death...again...and again."

Leon's spine bowed. He heard the crack of breaking bone. His vision turned red and he spit, "...coward!"

Vergil's laughter chased him into oblivion.

* * *

_The white wolf curled against his legs as he sat on the cold bench. The frigid push of air whipped the strands of his hair around his face as the first of the snowflakes tickled his nose. His gloved hand stroked between her velvety ears and down the curve of her neck._

_She'd saved his life in Spain. When the time had come, he'd domesticated her as best as he could and brought her to live with him. She'd been loyal, beside him until the day she'd died._

_Died?_

_He assumed so. In the wild, the wolf would often wander from the pack to perish. He'd always assumed she'd returned to the woods when her time had drawn near. He'd never named her, he knew even then, she already had a name. He knew now, as he sat beside her, that she hadn't died at all._

_She'd simply gone back to wherever her soul had been before that day._

_His mother._

_Quietly, he mused, "...what form did you take to protect your other sons?"_

_She was just sitting there beside him as if she'd always been. That was thing about dreams, you had little control, and there were no rules. The mind, the soul, the subconscious..it was a playground of emotion and magic. He wasn't sure how he knew she'd always been close, but he just felt it in his bones._

_Eva said, "There was little need with Dante and Vergil, they knew and never forgot, what they were and who they'd come from. They didn't spend a lifetime behind a mirror without the world they'd known to comfort them."_

_Leon nodded and scooted a little closer to her until the line of their sides brushed. She smiled, softly, and there was a shimmer of sadness on her, "...you're beautiful. In a way, the most like me. You have his face and my chin." _

_She touched the cleft in it, eyes sparkling, "I've done what I can for you now."_

_Leon nodded, staring at her like he might devour the memory of her face, "...are you real?"_

_She shrugged, "As real as you want me to be. It's possible I'm your memories, it's possible I'm what's left of me. The body dies, Lyo, and what remains is what defines us."_

_With some level of anger, his voice answered her, "...It's Leon. I'm Leon."_

_Eva cupped his cheek, "Yes...you always were I think. We're often meant to be who we become. You should discover things, Leon, about who you are. The woman in red...she has the answers."_

_He jerked, "...Ada?"_

_Eva laughed lightly, "Ada...such a simple name for someone so complicated. Ada, it is then. Look for Ada. Beware, as what's beyond the veil is looking for you. You've gone missing from a world where you were a warrior, Leon. They're searching for you. They'll find you, but they won't survive it if they do. Find Ada. Find Dante. Vergil...he's not lost. He's nearly gone...but he came...he came for you."_

_Her eyes teared. She gripped his hand and kissed his forehead, "He came...he will help you find who you are. Hurry. You're running out of time."_

_Time._

_It was all around him. _

_The reference wasn't lost on him. He lifted his arm and the watch there glittered in the sunlight. "...this?"_

_Eva smiled gently. "Time is either your enemy or yours to command, Leon. Think of when it was yours...you'll remember how to wield it like a weapon. Ada..." She laughed, shaking her head, "...she was always...so mischievous."_

_Leon furrowed his brow, "How do I find you?"_

_She touched his face, "I'm gone. You know my body is gone. What's left of me...well...that's in _**you."**

* * *

**New York - 9:15 a.m.**

* * *

They called her the bitch in red, but she was more than that. She was, it seemed, always a step ahead and a maneuver above. She knew things she shouldn't know, and survived when she should have died. She wasn't just a bitch.

Ada Wong was a witch.

At one time, she'd been one of the most nefarious umbra witches before Europe was a named place in history.

The mystery of her had kept her operating in a world with rules long after she'd shed the cloak of her own past and become a guardian. She'd traded her punishment at the hands of the clan for a chance at redemption. Eva, offering faith when she might have given death, tasked her with protecting her son at all costs. His path, she'd said, was his. She was to walk it, run it, and linger in the shadows to watch when she needn't interfere.

Eva had warned her, "...he has a purpose. I need you to be sure he achieves it."

And so shed who'd she'd been to become a beautiful spy in a time not her own.

It was easy to trade beauty for power in this world. She'd been something to fuck or something to covet to anything with a dick. Men, it seemed, were always predictable.

She tossed the cube on the table, pacing back and forth.

At least _most _men.

Eva's son had never been something she could figure out.

Brave in a way that was reckless, he'd run into a dying city to be a hero. He'd spent a lifetime making sure she _earned _her redemption. If he had a chance to risk his life, he found a way to take it.

She'd made it her personal mission to shadow him without fail.

And then she'd lost him. He'd walked into that castle and disappeared. Poof. Gone. A ghost. A figment. A fragment of something that resonated in the bowels of the abandoned shit hole like the foul stench of failure.

Gone.

She was desperately afraid that Mundus had found a way to reach out from the inferno and snatch him.

He'd been missing for almost three days. She'd searched high and low. She'd called in favors, she'd blackmailed, she'd beat answers out of those who would keep the truth to secure his capture. She wasn't sure if he was lost, or just forsaken.

She was starting to panic.

She couldn't reach Morrison for answers.

Something was happening.

A shimmer in the window behind her caught her eye - a raven, black and bold, sitting on the heavy stone bust of a lion across the street from her on the adjacaent building. A raven - a watchdog of a demon that had spent too long being kept in the shadow of another. With Mundus contained, apparently she'd taken her moment to try to find her ascension.

There was no Dark Knight Sparda to stand in her way this time.

She would need his blood to achieve the power it would take to free herself. He was dead or gone or lost in the sands of time or hiding. There was no getting his blood. There was no g-

Ada froze. Her eyes widened. She didn't need Sparda directly to get his blood.

She could use his _son._

_"...god damnit."_

She needed to act swiftly to make sure it wasn't something that ended in blood and burnt souls. She drummed her fingers on the counter top in her penthouse apartment and shook her head. She didn't generally work inside her own inhabitance, but she was running out of time here. She shed her clothing and strode naked into her bedroom.

On her bureau, a beautiful gold athame waited with a razor sharp edge. Ada plied it to her right hand, chanted softly, and placed her bloody palm on the mirror before her.

The mirror shimmered, the swirling glass turning red and wavering as a face appeared. It wasn't human, hadn't ever been, and offered a countenance that somehow flickered through features until you couldn't be sure what you were seeing. "...a dangerous game you play, witch."

Ada smiled through a flash of teeth and shadows, "A dangerous one you do, Lillith. Show me Sparda's son...I know you have him."

The shifting mirror laughed with delight. "You seek the wrong son. This one...he stays out of devotion. He is mine. You cannot have him."

Ada felt the flicker of power slap at the mirror. They tested each other, but the bond of blood held strong, stopping Lillith from stepping through the mirror into the world of men where she stood. "You can't use him to bring the war you want, Lillith. You can't lay claim to the world you feel like Sparda stole from you. Release him, before you bring about your own doom."

"You won't threaten me, you flesh and bone bitch, I don't cow before your wasted powers. You are nothing but a sack of meat and skin there. You have no power. You gave it up to play nursemaid to a worthless warrior whose potential will never be reached. It seems I have the powerful one, and you were saddled with the useless son. Once I find Vergil, I'll have a pretty pair...perhaps I'll use them to murder their third...and you with him."

Interesting, Ada thought, Lillith didn't know about Leon. She didn't know where he was either. Whichever son she had, she didn't have him. Based on her speaking, she had to have somehow laid claim to Dante.

It was imperative to get him back as quickly as possible.

Ada tilted her head, "And yet you're still playing footsie in the cold dark...if you could break free, you'd have done it. What's keeping you there, you sallow faced hag? Maybe you're finding out that one brother just isn't enough...maybe you need _all three _to break free."

Lillith hissed like a snake at her, "...I will enjoy bathing in the shower of your blood, you righteous bitch."

"...you gotta break free first...and you were always the weakest of the demons."

Lillth spat at her as Ada wiped the mirror.

Time.

They were on borrowed versions of it.

If Leon wasn't in captivity, where was he!?

She needed to find him. It was time to go back to the beginning. The answers to where he was were there somewhere.

She dressed swiftly, hooking her grappling gun to her thigh holster, and hurried toward her red Maserati. It was time to return to the birthplace of a hero.

It was time to go back to Raccoon City.

* * *

**9:52 a.m. Red Grave City**

* * *

They knelt across from each other in the cold air. Vergil tilted his head, searching a familiar face on an unfamiliar man. He mused, breath puffing white, "...why did you keep the hair of our mother?"

Leon's shoulder lifted as he rolled the hilt of the borrowed sword in his palm, "I can't answer that."

"You know nothing then?"

They circled each other as foes might before a battle.

"I know who I am."

"...do you?" Vergil paused, brows arched, "You know who you pretended to be...forget this shell you try so hard to hold onto...become what you're meant to be. Awaken."

Leon's teeth flashed, "I did that."

"...no. You resisted. Why?" They circled more beneath the sagging specter of what had once been, shimmering in a power of what was still there, "I need you to awaken. I need to know the truth."

Leon paused, shaking his head, "...what's the truth?"

"If we can...merge." Vergil considered him. His mouth lifted into a smile, "Can we? Can I take what's in you into myself? Are we...not brothers...but pieces of Sparda himself split into physical form? Would combining us...reawaken him?"

Leon froze. He lifted the sword and laughed, the sound echoing around the empty remains, "You think we're pieces of him? Like what? We'll just merge together and form _Voltron?"_

Trish smiled, shaking her head. Somethings remained true, if he was a piece of someone...it was Dante. Vergil lacked the witty disparaging foreplay that Dante seemed to adore before a battle. Leon, apparently, was the same. He taunted before he fought.

What brought about that behavior? A playful piece of a man that meant he was more than just a killer. It was often infuriating on Dante, why did she find it charming on his brother?

Vergil considered him, "I don't know what we'll become...perhaps it's simply meant to help us find him...I need to find him...I _need _to find him."

Leon laughed lightly, "Then what is this? Kill me and take me over. Isn't that what you want?"

Vergil retorted, "I need you to awaken. I need you to come into your full power. I need you to lose to me, as Dante will, and then we'll know...then I'll know...I'll finally know..."

Leon's brows furrowed again, "Know what!?"

"...which of us was meant to rule...enough talk...show me what useless skills our mother left you."

Vergil rushed him, pushing through the world in a way that wasn't and would never be human. But he didn't strike and slaughter, not this time. Time, it seemed, wasn't on his side anymore.

The sword in Leon's hand came up, a defensive parry, and the blades struck in mid air. Vergil swung back to strike again and the watch on Leon's hand glimmered in the sunlight.

_Time is either your enemy or yours to command, Leon._

Time had always been the answer.

His hand curled into a fist and he punched forward as if he'd hit Vergil in the kidneys. The blow landed, Vergil looked at him in surprise, and everything just...stopped. After a moment, Leon realized he was still waiting for Vergil to collapse around the hit. Vergil's blade was still kissing Leon's. A single snowflake was inches from his left eye.

Leon let go of his sword and it stayed just as it was, suspended, blocking Vergil from taking his head. Vergil's face was still collapsed in pain. Morrison was in mid exhale. Lady was hooting and heckling while sitting on a column. Trish was crouched and watching, her face soft in a way that made him stare for a moment.

Gathering himself, he looked at his wrist. The watch had closed on the face with some kind of...teeth? It glowed gold and was warm. He touched it, felt the shiver of power, and shook his head, "...wicked."

He had a moment to remember Spain. He pictured himself - a young, arrogant, freshly trained recruit with a Pandora's box of skills. He was always better, faster, stronger and more impervious. The lasers had come, the lasers had missed, and he'd strode victorious toward saving the day.

But he realized, in this moment, that the lasers had come, the lasers had _stopped, _and he'd been able to dodge them. He'd dodged lasers because he was part devil.

Leon shook his head. He paced a little and made sense of it. No. Not devil. He'd stopped the lasers because he was part, "...witch."

Ridiculous.

What kind of world had he stepped into?

He'd have given anything in that moment for a simple zombie outbreak and some undead to slaughter. As it stood, he had to figure out how to unfreeze time. Taking advantage, he moved around behind Vergil, reached under his shirt, and jerked his underwear right up his ass. If he had to freeze time, might as well give the old bastard a wedgie from hell.

Maybe literally from hell?

He had so much he needed to learn here.

He used Vergil's jacket to bind his arms on top of the wedgie, kicked his brother twice in the stomach, divested him of his weapon and stuck the other one clean through his upper chest to pin him to the wall. The second Vergil twitched, time sped back up.

Everything snapped into focus.

Vergil let out a roar of pain - either the underwear up his ass or the sword spitting him like a pig at a picken. Lady let out a whoop of surprise. Morrison stopped smoking to stare. Trish rose from the ground with wide eyes.

Dangling on his weapon, Vergil sneered, "...trickery! Lies! Deceit! What devilry is this!?"

Leon laughed, tossing the Yamato from hand to hand and finding himself impressed with its weight, "Not devilry, dear brother, _witchcraft. _Apparently, Mom left me with some tricks too. Next time you try to prove what a joke I am, think about that underwear crammed up your tight ass. You're lucky I didn't kick you in the balls while I was at it."

Lady laughed with delight. Trish touched Leon's arm as he rolled the Yamato in his palm. He turned his gaze to her and she mused, "...the watch."

He nodded. He glance down at it. "What is it?"

She smiled, shaking her head, "...something that should have been destroyed a long time ago. It started as a bracelet I think - a gift for a witch with a plan to strike back the dark...I think it's time we talk about your mother and what came long before the devil she'd help escape his bonds of evil."

Vergil fell into a pool of his blood and spit, "We don't have time for talk! The time for talk is done! I want what was promised to me!"

Trish shook her head, looking disappointed, "Nothing was promised to you, you fool. You are one of a triumvirate now. Stop trying to find a way to make yourself the only, and realize that you need to become a team. You need to find your other brother. You need to bring yourselves together to discover why Eva died protecting you and why Sparda sealed himself away to ensure your safety. Power won't save you, Vergil...but family might."

Lady added her two cents from the sidelines, "I want Dante back. Cute as this one is, he isn't Dante. Work with us to find him. At the very least, you'll get the fun that comes from fighting both of your brothers when we do."

Vergil rose from the ground. He looked mired in anger. With conviction, Leon urged, "Help me. The sooner I know what I can do, the sooner you can see how it benefits _you."_

He put out his hand. His brother pulled his underwear out of his ass and gave him a filthy look.

But the hands that gripped and shook were determined.

Vergil squeezed hard and warned him, "When this is over, I'm going to take that watch."

Leon laughed and met him sneer for sneer, with just a hint of an excited smile, "I would _love _to see you try."

Vergil tossed his hand away and turned around to meet Morrison in the cold air. They crossed toward the house to start looking for answers. Leon shook his head, "That guy needs a vacation."

Trish laughed lightly.

With a hoot of cheer, Lady urged them, "Great! Game on! Now somebody use all this dick measuring to find Dante!"

Leon glanced at Trish who smiled and confided, "...it's what you think."

Amused, he teased, "...shit...she deserves better than that ugly bastard. He might have bested me with that big ass sword, but his witty repartee was as stale and tired as that haircut he was sporting."

With a snort, Lady scoffed, "That's rich coming from a guy who apparently didn't get the memo that the Titanic sank. Just let go, Jack...let go!"

She elbowed him aside to follow Morrison and Vergil.

Trish informed him, gently, "I like the hair...suits you."

He eyed her, brow arched, flicking his gaze to her mouth and back to her eyes, "Oh, yeah? Bit of a fan of a bad boy, are ya?"

She winked, trying out her flirting, and backed up toward the house, "...what can I say...I've got a little devil in me..."

He grinned and offered, "Want a little more?"

Trish laughed and teased, "...it's a shame it's so little...I hear Dante's devil is enormous."

She spun toward the house, Leon called with a chuckle, "...ouch! God _damn_ I love a woman with some sass! I'm gonna show you my devil trigger soon enough, woman, just say the word."

Her laughter floated around him as she disappeared. Still smiling, he glanced down at his wrist. Time.

It was his now.

The question was how much he had left before it ran out.


	6. ProdigalSon6

**Prodigal Son**

* * *

**Chapter Six:**

**Fire and Time**

* * *

**10 a.m. Devil May Cry**

* * *

His body smacked into the wall with a thud and a grunt from him. Annoyed, Leon shook his head and wondered, "How is it...I have the power to control time, literally, and somehow you're still beating my ass?"

Trish, dewy with sweat, slung her long hair behind her shoulder and mused, "You'd prefer I spank it instead?"

His teeth flashed in a grin. "Only if you make me a sandwich first, kid."

She laughed and returned, "Make your own sandwich, you neanderthal."

"If I was that...I'd pull your hair and drag you to me."

They held eyes and he added, his flashing with good humor, "...you might like that though."

Trish laughed musically and shoved him playfully into the wall again. In the last few days, she'd really come around with that growing personality of hers. He could see that being around Dante had clearly taught her how to sling shit like a man. He wasn't sure why she dressed like a Hell's Angel in all that leather of hers, but the mouth and the look and the attitude worked somehow - she was feminine, bad ass, and built like a Playboy centerfold in one package.

What did they call that? Oh, right...a 10. The puppet Mundus had made to resemble their mother was a 10. Maybe he should feel weird about the wood he got when he looked at her, but it was hard to do that when he didn't see Trish as his mother at all. It wasn't her fault she shared the face. Was it his fault he shared Dante's?

Vergil was a little harder to read. He was never friendly, generally always grumpy, and mostly stared into the beyond like he could see ghosts or something. He was, for lack of a better word, spooky. Leon got the impression he was seeing things the rest of them were missing.

The strength Leon had harnessed was growing daily. As Trish swung a hook at him, he blocked it, caught her throat, and simply threw her across the room. It was still surreal to know he _could, _let alone be comfortable with the radiating power that came with the sheer joy of strength. She tucked and rolled through the toss, finding her feet with a smile.

"Getting smoother."

Leon, winking, remarked, "Not just these skills, darlin. Let me show you how smooth I am upstairs too."

Trish rolled her eyes. He was, it seemed, as bad as his brother with flirting. Dante was careful to avoid it with her, but he laid it as thick as molasses with Lady. Leon, it seemed, was half serious, half teasing with his invites to his bed. She wondered if she should just take him and be done with it.

But there wasn't time for that. They were closer to Dante than they'd been a day ago. This morning, they'd received a transmission from a woman named Ada Wong. The second the email had printed out, Leon had mused, "...shit...even lost in limbo she can find me."

Trish, brow furrowed, had mused, "Limbo?"

He'd laughed and answered, "Yeah...trapped somewhere between heaven and hell, right? Limbo."

Lady had answered, impressed, "...you got that right, handsome. Now who the hell is she?"

Out came a convoluted story with more holes than seemed plausible - a friend, an alley, an enemy...a lover. The moment he spoke of their affair, Trish felt something vaguely interesting. It was a shiver of some emotion she couldn't name.

When he'd left the lobby with the fax, something must have been on her face because Lady mused, "...what's up? You look like someone kicked your puppy."

Trish had shrugged and returned, "He...naked with her. That woman he spoke of...she was his lover. Is? Is his lover? Something."

Amused, Lady nodded, "She was, apparently...though he doesn't act like a guy who has a full on sweetie waiting for him."

Trish thought about that as Morrison and Leon worked together to trace the origin of the email. He lifted his head and told Trish, "It looks like she sent it as a hail Mary pass. She had to have no idea if I'd get it or not. But how can she know about Dante? And who is Lillith?"

The moment he said it, Morrison and Trish caught eyes over his head. Lady was the one who filled the silence, "...fucker in fat red boots...Lillith?"

Morrison moved away from the email to a far shelf covered in dust and old books. Leon, annoyed, queried, "What is it? Who is this bitch? Apparently, she's got Dante. So, how do we find her?"

Lady was already hurrying away with a snap of anger, "I'll get Vergil. Mother fucker...how much time?!"

Morrison called back, "If she's had him five days now...hours."

Pissed off at being ignored, Leon shouted, "Hey! Stop your Rescue Rangers shit and look at me!"

Trish grabbed his forearm and soothed, "Lillith was one of the original demons to attempt human form." She guided Leon to sit down and crouched, putting a hand on his knee to look up at him as she spoke, "...there's no brooking any kind of delicacy here in saying she was well before Eva's time in securing your father's affections."

Lady scoffed and added, "Affections, my ass. Lillith was a demon and so was he then. It was nothing but blood and slaughter for them."

Trish, looking aggrieved, tried to soften the blow, "Your father found redemption, Leon, remember that...but there was a time he was known as a marauder. He was very good at laying claim to souls. He filled the realm with souls and used a sword known as the Harbinger to bring them...home."

Leon shook his head, "So he was a big, bad, nasty demon."

"...essentially." She rubbed his knee gently, "Eva...the story there is softer somehow. She found him just as he'd started to seek redemption. What we can find on her tells us that she was in a state of seeking her own. They banded together, and made history. Sparda was no longer a Dark Knight...he became a White one."

Leon tilted his head, "...you selling me a Paladin story?"

Lady chuckled. Morrison filled the moment with a telling statement, "...no need. You're the **Paladin.** You and Dante. You always were."

Leon shook his head, denying that, "I'm no white knight, people. Don't do that, don't grant me some kind of sainthood. I'm guilty of all kinds of sins."

Trish, quietly, reminded him, "We all are. Dante is notorious for his."

Lady chuckled, "He is...the bastard." She shook her head and her face humor leveled into concern, "What does it mean if she's had him this long? What are we saying?"

Trish, rising, told her, "You know what it means."

Morrison cursed and blew out cigar smoke, "We're out of time."

From the stair way, Vergil informed them, "Yes. He'll be hers if we don't retrieve him."

Leon rose and invited, "So, let's get his ass. Where? What do we do?"

Trish turned and asked, face soft, "Where would she go...this Ada? Where? Somewhere important, somewhere you'd have history together...somewhere you could create a gateway to your brother through memory and blood. The house where your mother dwelled...it's not the gate. We'd have found it there...so where? Where should we look?"

Leon paced a little and finally froze. His gaze flicked to Morrison who nodded and laughed, dryly, "...yes. That's where I found you."

Lady tilted her head. Trish shook hers. The woman formerly known as Mary wondered, "...where?"

But it was Vergil who answered, "...the beginning for him...the place he became Leon Kennedy...and then became a legend."

Lady arched a brow. Trish spoke softly, "Taking him there is dangerous...they'll be looking for him...his other life is hunting him. It's dangerous."

Morrison nodded, "But necessary."

Vergil moved toward Dante's supply cabinet as Lady stubbornly snapped, "Where!? What the hell are you talking about? Where are we going?"

Softly, with a note of old regret, Leon told her, "...where else? Raccoon City."

* * *

**1 p.m. -Raccoon City - 1998**

* * *

_The only thing he knows, is he doesn't belong here._

_He can't remember who he is. He can't remember what he is. His hands shiver in front of his face where he's bound to the floor. He's on his knees. He's trapped. There's a tattoo on the inside of his wrist beneath the blood._

_Part of name. But he can barely make it out through the blood. The blood...THE BLOOD._

_Who is he? **Where** is he?_

_It's musty. It's dusty. It's dark. The cold is permeating from the floor into his filthy jeans. He's terrified of the blood on his hands. He can scent it, like an animal. He can tell he's not injured. Not really._

_He's also not alone._

_There's a body on the floor three feet to his left. Male. In a suit. Curled on it's side. The smell of rotting shit floats around his nostrils. He doesn't know if the body beside him is dead. He doesn't know anything._

_He whispers, "Hello?"_

_And the body doesn't answer._

_But his voice is hoarse, his throat scratchy and dry. How does he know he's a man? Well, the voice. The arms. The hands. All male. He glances at his torso in the thermal shirt he's wearing. It's blue. It's tight enough to let him know he's also in supreme physical shape. He's no slouch._

_But who is he?_

_From the shadows, across the room, a voice whispers back and startles him. Scares him to death. "Who's there?"_

_He can almost make out a face in the darkness. Pretty. Filthy. Dark haired and female. She's bleeding from a cut above her eye. She's bound in a chair to a pipe with her arms behind her. There's a knife on the floor at her left foot. The body of the man in the suit is between them._

_She's familiar. Her face resonates. It rankles in his brains. Who is she?_

_She queries, quietly, "Where are we?"_

_And he answers, "I don't know. Can you remember anything?"_

_He voice quavers, "...no." Their eyes seek the body between them together. Her lips tremble, "Is he dead?"_

_"...I don't know." He shifts and calls to the body again, gently, "Sir? Are you awake?"_

_Her eyes shift to the knife at her boot. It's bloody. It's lying in a pool of it. But her hands? Clean. His? Covered in blood. She whimpers, softly and they both hold gazes._

_He murmurs, "Did I kill him?"_

_And she answers, "I don't know. I don't know anything."_

_"...me either." Afraid, they stare at the body between them. And they're still staring when it stirs. It groans. It makes a small sputtering gurgle. She gives him a horrified look over it._

_He's farther away. The body twitches oddly. It moves like it's pulled by strings. It flops an arm out and smacks the dirty boards. The room shakes around them. The whole building feels dilapidated. It feels rotten. It feels like it's falling down._

_It's a horror movie. A horror movie with bad acting. A horror movie with...zombies. Because the answer is clear now: the body isn't dead...it's undead._

_It reaches for her boots and she squeals, kicking at it. Her face flashes with fear and panic. He shifts toward her, jerking on his bonds on the floor. "Hey!" He class to the zombie as it crawls toward her, "Hey hey hey! Over here!"_

_The noise alerts it. It shifts, fish eyes finding him, "Yeah. Over here. Come on. Leave her be."_

_It lumbers toward him, dragging it's useless legs behind it. It's mouth hangs open, cavernously, showing rotting teeth and purple gums. It drools, it blubbers, gurgling in its half savaged throat. The answer is there too - he'd stabbed it in the throat alright. He'd tried to kill it. The knife. The wound. The blood. He'd killed it - when it was a man. Why?_

_It doesn't matter. Because the zombie lunges for him and has the girl shouting in fear. He isn't sure how he knows, but somehow his body just...responds. He tumbles to the left and and misses the lunging mouth of the thing. It glances off his shoulder and he hooks his elbow over its rotting skull to push it toward the floor._

_He tries to manipulate it to crush it with his knee, but that's easier said than done when you're bound to the floor on your knees. He rolls his shoulder as that snapping mouth takes a crack at his denim clad knee. He elbows it in the side of the head for its effort. The skin sloughs off and leaves naked bone behind in a wet slurp of mess._

_Groaning in disgust, he tries to crush its head by throwing another elbow at it. But that doesn't work either. His range is limited where he's bound. It goes to take a bite out of his hip and the girl whistles._

_She whistles and shouts, "HEY! OVER HERE!"_

_It rolls it's fisheyes toward her and his fingers brush the pen in its breast pocket of its suit. He figures, what the hell? And takes a chance. The pen pulls free, the thing turns back to take a chomp of his belly, and he puts the pen through its left fisheye. Hard._

_He shoves it home like he's trying to pierce its rotting brain -which he is._

_And it slumps toward him and down, gurgling wetly before it goes still. His brain twitches, watching it "die". He glances over at the girl in the chair. She whispers, softly, "Are you Dante?"_

_Surprised, he blinks twice, "I don't know. Do you? Whose Dante? Do you know me?"_

_And she gestures with her head, "No...but look."_

_His head turns. On the wall behind him, written in blood:** DANTE-** REMEMBER WHO YOU ARE._

_That's the thing...he can't. And he's afraid they'll never escape if he can't._

_He stares at the blood, his brain beating inside his skull like a hammer made of fear. Who was he? There are pieces that trickle in his head, jumbled and thick and murky._

_The girl in the chair urges him, desperately, "What does that mean?"_

_He has no answer. He can't remember what it means. Did he write it? Is that his handwriting? He doesn't know that either. Is it hers?_

_His gazes holds hers across the dark room. She looks so familiar, but is that because he wants her to be? His mind tosses images up at him like razors through his memory._

_Bombs. Blood. Bullets. He's had a hard life. He just knows he's not a normal dude. He just knows it. His guts tell him he was something else._

_The only pieces of memory he starts to grab have a man with glasses. There's a red haired kid. There's a monster. And a woman in a red dress. There's the image of snakes and blood and swirling air. He's terrified and lost and broken. He's alone. He's **alone. **_

_They all spill around his skull in a dance of the damned. What does it mean?_

_His foot kicks over the body to stare at its face. Handsome, minus the pen sticking out of it. But who is it? The face echoes in his head. Who is it?_

_The one thought he can grab is a single name: Eva._

_Who is Eva?_

_He looks up at the woman in front of him and asks, "Eva?"_

_She shakes her head. "I'm sorry...I don't know...you lover?"_

_He doesn't really know that either. But he remembers the feeling of her. Jill - the name makes his heart race. Jill must be important. She must matter. Who is she? His wife? His lover? That doesn't feel right either. Those words ring hollow. Who is Eva?_

_Who is **he**?_

_That name beats around his skull for a moment._

_He tries to grab for the breast pockets on the suit of the corpse and the sound of feet on the stairs makes him pause. The woman whines quietly in her throat, "Oh god, we're not alone."_

_They aren't. There's someone on the stairs. Is it help?_

_But the thing that comes through the shadows isn't a man. Maybe it never was. However...it is hungry...and they're out of time._

_The man who'd once been the only thing between hell on earth and hope has forgotten who he is. It won't be long now...until he's lost completely._

* * *

**Somewhere betwixt and between...**

* * *

Llilith swirled in a circle. She pointed to the minions shifting through the shadows laughing, "I've bound him there...let's see how long it takes for them to find him. His fear _fuels _me...his needs _fill me up..." _Her hands passed over her groin, "Oh...oh...imagine...all three together...the sons of Sparda...in my hands...hurry..."

She watched the shimmer of gold hair on the murky water in the bowl beside her, "...hurry...soon I will have you _all."_

Ada Wong be damned. She'd finished that bitch off in the easiest way possible and laid breadcrumbs in a path that circled sweetly around toward destiny. They were coming, the fools, to find a brother lost to his own arrogance.

He'd thought to play her..._her! _Like his father before him, he'd thought that trifling with Lillith meant you could rule her. Did he think a beautiful cock and a pretty face would sway her? Lust and greed and sex were hers to command. She ruled them. She owned them. She _was _them.

She played his own fears back on him and made him _nothing. _Now he was stuck in a memory of a time before he was anything, when he was a _man - _a meatsack. A worthless, soul filled smart ass without a sword or a hope of surviving. Let him face the things his brother had killed in that burning city. Let him see what it was like to fight like a _mortal. _

She would teach him humility and humanity in a way that would bring him back to her side to remember he was a _DEVIL. _And he wanted nothing to do with humans. She'd cultivate his demon soul and leave it raw and red for his brother to find. They'd come to her seeking revenge, and find a reckoning instead.

Tauntingly, she wondered, "...why leave your boys without protection, you stupid, stupid, insipid fool...I'd warned you once not to betray me...this is how I make sure you pay for _eternity."_

Wherever he was, Sparda was about to find out how she could tear down the empire he'd spent a life time building. It was time to smoke out the coward and see if he was willing to fight to save what mattered most. How much humanity was left in him? He'd let his bitch die to cover his tracks.

Would he let his sons die as well?

* * *

**10 a.m. -Raccoon City - Present Day **

* * *

The carcass of a once great city left him a little mired in something cloying that he wanted to call fear. Surprised by it, Leon accepted that Raccoon would always feel that way to him - like the place he'd been birthed in blood to become a monster. Amused by the whimsical thought, picturing a phoenix who'd risen from the ashes to become something strong and beautiful, he figured he was getting pieces of his mother's thoughts mixed with his own.

His mother, it seemed, was bound to the piece around his wrist, making it clear she was still with him and speaking through thoughts instead of words. He wasn't sure why, but Leon was comforted by her presence. He stood in the shell of what remained and felt like he'd spent too much time sifting through the ashes.

It was time to determine how much power the thing on his wrist granted him.

Could he rewind all the way back to the beginning?

Could he reverse his whole life?

Could he bring back Raccoon?

Was he about to change the past and rewrite the future? Where was Dante? Why was he here? _How _was he here? Where was Ada? Could he rewind time and save his mother?

The thought gave him pause. What if he could change the world? Would he? What was the old saying? Bad things happen to those who mess with time. What if he made it worse?

What if his mother died some other more tragic way?

The fire. The fire was everywhere. In his dreams, in his past, in his present - everything was burning. What did that mean? Was fire the key? Was time and fire the key?

Or was it simply a matter of knowing that the world was meant to burn and all they could do was wait to raise again from the ashes. Time and fire - he was surrounded by one and running out of the other. How did he stop it all?

He lifted his hand - the face of the watch taunted him -and he knew he was going to have to change the past, to save the future.


	7. Chapter 7

**Prodigal Son**

* * *

**Chapter 7:**

**Days Gone**

* * *

Leon must have stared at his watch for far too long because it drew the attention of a certain blonde that was thinking something similar - what was the key to stopping Lillith? Was it Leon? Was it brotherhood?

Had Eva known her boys would face the fight of their lives and only succeed...together?

Trish turned her attention to Leon and tilted her head. It was biased, perhaps, to see the edge of something from both his brother's in him. He had, somehow, gotten Dante's drive to protect and Vergil's need for power. He was the epicenter of them both. How? Why? What was it inside of him that Eva had seen as the bridge between Dante's light and Vergil's darkness?

Was it the promise of a perfect mirror to them both?

Quietly, Leon murmured, "...fire and time..."

And it was _that. _He had an inherent genius that was impressive. She'd listened to Morrison talk about him in that way that sounded like a proud papa. She understood that Leon was brilliant in his own way, resilient and impulsively creative. The intelligence was the kicker - it was the face that drew you, no lie there, but it was that intelligence that sparkled around him like magic that held you.

He had magic in his blood from his mother, but he'd made his own as he'd grown. She was having trouble separating her feelings regarding him. Curious about it, she explored the emotion swirling in her belly - what was it? Lust?

He furrowed his brow as he studied his watch and pursed his lips and her body reacted. Yes, lust, but that wasn't all of it. It was...what? Knowing? She had some knowledge of him that should have felt maternal and wasn't, wouldn't ever be...she wasn't channeling Eva's feelings for him, she was harboring her own. The echo of her time with Mundus made Trish consider what he'd shown her - she didn't often think of her time before he'd sent her to seduce the power from Dante and destroy him.

The moment she'd met Dante, something like love had bitten her...but there, that love...it had made sense. It was echoes of Eva's love for her son. Where was the echo for Leon? Where was Eva?

Why was it only Trish when looking at the last of the sons of Sparda?

Was it a sign that she was meant to love this son...the most?

It clearly meant she was to love him differently.

Even Vergil evoked memories of a lost family when she looked at him, but Leon..there was no channel between her and Eva that made her feel maternal for him. She almost wished there was. It would be less confusing. Her soul, it _knew _Leon, but her body...her heart...these were simply hungry for him.

She wanted to ask Eva for guidance, but the voice that often whispered in her head was silent. Apparently, it was her job to figure out her feelings for the boy who'd once been called Ulysses.

With a sigh, Leon speculated, "...can I push the past and change the future?"

As if reading his thoughts on how far back he meant to go, Trish murmured, "It doesn't work that way."

He tilted his head at her and she informed him, "You can rewind enough time to fix some things...but even there...what would you be looking for?"

He inhaled slowly. His gaze swept the ruins. Enough had survived the bombing to look like a city post war. It was a pathetic sight, to be sure, but there were structures that had remained in tact. There was endless wasteland to explore.

Vergail remarked, "...he's here."

Leon glanced at him with surprise and Vergil, not looking at him, added, "Stop looking and _feel."_

Sure. Just like that? Leon closed his eyes. He opened his mind and a surge of emotion made two tears slip down his cheeks. Undone, Trish caught his arms above the elbows as he told them, voice shaky, "...he's not alone...he's..."

Leon hunched forward. Trish surged to catch him and he leaned heavily on her as his voice switched to fearful and raw, "..._he's so afraid...it **hurts."**_

Concerned, she started to shake him and Vergil stilled her hand, "Let him...he's channeling...let him do it."

Leon whimpered, sounding small and scared, "..._he's coming...he's coming for us both...where are you? Mommy?...the fire hurts."_

He slumped. Trish made a sound of distress and Morrison informed them, "...in 98 before the fall, the orphanage burned when the Birkin girl was taken by her father to cover up the body of Irons. They never knew who burned it down, but it was suspected to be an inside job."

Lady nodded and lifted her weapon, rolling it around in her hands, "So maybe we try the old home for the hopeless."

Quietly, Morrison warned them, "...the children there were nothing more than experiments. Some suspected the Chief had prurient interests as well...they speculated he'd rape them before he killed them, stuffing them like trophies to hang on his walls."

Lady spit on the ground at his memory, "...pig."

Leon, letting Trish guide him back to his feet, spoke in his own voice again now, clear and strong, "He did. He was a fucking monster in his own right, long before he became a real one. Birkin ripped his head off for touching his daughter in that place...Sherry escaped with a parasite in her...and Irons got what was coming to him...why would Dante be there? And how?"

Trish answered, gently, "Lillith would feed off that kind of energy. She'd adore it. Lust, perverse or not, plays into her being. She'd thrill off the death, the fear, the pain and torture...the rape. It's what demons crave."

He looked at her sadly, "...you crave that?"

And she answered, "...not anymore."

Vergil laughed, lightly, "What good does it do to stand here mourning the dead? We have no time for this. Dante is there...let's find him. Now."

He stalked forward. Leon watched him go with a shake of his head, "...is it love?"

Trish sighed. Lady laughed with derision and remarked, "...right. Old soulless shithead up there loves his brother? You wish. Vergil wants Dante's blood and power. That's all it's ever been. Love? Vergil hasn't felt that since Eva died."

Morrison watched Lady follow Vergil down the gutted street. He sighed and shook his head, "...she's not entirely wrong...but it's more complex than that. Vergil cares...and I think that pisses him off more than anything."

He followed Lady. Trish stood beside Leon and mused, "...are you concerned...about your friend?"

Leon arched a brow. She shrugged a little, "...the Wong woman."

Leon chuckled and fell into step beside her, "You mean the wrong one?"

Trish snorted and he informed her, "Ada's beautiful...and deadly. She's not something you keep."

Trish smiled slyly and mused, "I might like her."

Leon laughed and nodded, "You might...you share some things in common...and one very important thing you don't."

Trish tilted her head as they walked, "Which is?"

"...Ada doesn't care about anything but her own agenda. She's kept me alive all this time, there must be a bigger game at stake. She cares about me...as much as she can I guess...and I think the sex was just a by product of adrenaline and sheer physical need...but there's no love lost, Trish...for either of us. She's not a woman you love."

Trish nodded and finally wondered, "...she's a woman you want though."

He paused. She realized he'd stopped walking and blinked, turning to look at him. He scanned her face, tilted his head one way and then back the other, and finally scoffed, "You think I'm here because I want her?"

Trish shrugged, "I think you don't know Dante. He's nothing to you. Why else?"

He nodded and started walking again. She fell into step beside him once more and he finally told her, "...maybe he's nothing...but you're not."

She jerked a little as he added, "...he matters to you and she's important to me, though not in a way that you need to worry about." He glanced at her and finally finished, "I'm here for you too, Trish...because I get the feeling you're someone to love. Dante clearly does...but not the right way."

Trish, a little breathless, whispered, "...what's the right one?"

He leaned toward her ear and confided, "...soft...slow...and then over and over again until you can't walk and you just lie there...waiting for more."

Trish tripped. She never tripped. Her boot hooked on a piece of rebar and sent her sprawling. She might have hit her knees, but he caught her arm and held her upright. She was uncommonly graceful.

She _never _tripped.

The way he spoke to her made her breathless.

He started to tease her, smiling wolfishly, "...sorry. Bad timing remember? I tend to open my mouth and forget where I'm at. I should f-"

Her body turned into him. He made a small sound of happiness and her lips pressed to his. It was brief and chaste but somehow desperate. He gripped both of her arms above the elbow tight enough to make her gasp.

The most innocuous of kisses, fueled by the most desperate burst of need.

They both let go and Trish warned him, "...we shouldn't do that. Not here, not now, not this close to a gateway."

Leon tilted his head again, "...a gateway?"

Trish nodded. She turned her face and gestured with her chin. Over his shoulder, the wind trembled, and he could _see _the glimmer of something more inside of it. Surprised, his brows sprang upward and he mused, "I'll be damn-"

There was a long cry of a baby that made them all freeze. He watched something emerge out of nowhere and scrambled toward them. A licker? Not exactly. It was more insect than that, and less human somehow. It skittered until he fired at it, reflexively, and then it took flight and screamed. The scream was somehow human.

It was alarming. It flickered with wings and flew upward into the air, squealing and afraid. A sharp shot took it down in mid-flight and it splattered blood blue in a flashing arc as it fell. It hit the pavement, Leon stared at it, and Trish told him, "...beezlebub...a lesser demon...often mistaken for a child in the other realm."

"...the other?"

She nodded, kicking the body with her boot to be sure it was dead, "...there's no division here...can't you feel it? Someone opened the gateway...you were right, Leon, about this place...it's the hell-mouth...it's the hub...it's here. Whatever is waiting...it's _here."_

Great.

Lesser demons. What else was waiting?

He should have never thought it, because it was like he invited the trouble. There was a roar that shook the walls around them. They scattered as if the ground had erupted an earthquake. From the ruins in front of him, a wall exploded in mortar and charred steel. A beam flew in a swirling mess, trying to take his head as he tackled Trish to the ground and felt the wind brush where they'd been.

No demons this time...he'd faced this particular flavor of nuisance before. El gigante, the troll with no soul, a freak of a thing that towered above a building without breaking a sweat. It was scaly gray and infected with a l_os plagas_ parasite that powered it's spine and kept it nearly insulated against common attacks. There was the stench of sulfur around it, reminding him this one was exactly like the few he'd faced in Spain - this one was evil.

It sounded funny to say it, but it was the possessed soul of its long dead brethren. It opened it's mouth and roared and the wall melted where it's breath touched. Excellent, he thought sarcastically, immense strength and killer bad breath. The perfect deadly combination.

He shouted, "Vergil! In the back of the goddamn thing is a parasite, wound the face and neck to get the fucking thing to emerge and attempt to protect it's host! When it's exposed, cut that fucking thing out like a bitch who did you wrong!"

In the distance, Vergil's laugh was surprising. Apparently, his dull faced brother could be amused after all. For a moment, there was a flicker of boys who'd once tossed shit at each other as brother's often will. They'd loved each other once, the memories of that became clearer the closer they got to Dante.

Leon backed up, attempting to put Trish behind him and had her musing, "Protecting me? Aren't you adorable."

She cut left and raced around him. He stood for a moment as she simply flashed yellow and took on her devil form. It was...beautiful. She became light and speed. She raced up a wall as if she were made of wings and wind and leapt on the face of the thing that wanted to kill them.

When it started to grab for her, Leon shot it in the arm.

Lady emerged and whistled, Trish rolled up its face to its back, and the bicolored beauty put some of kind of heavy round into the damn monster and blew it's throat out in a disgusting tableau of violence. He could see the bone and the muscle working to heal as she loaded up again on that enormous beast of a gun of hers.

Vergil chose that moment to streak in from the side and start slicing at the open throat. Trish was on the back of the thing just slashing away. Leon, convinced he was the weakest link here, ran for the stamping giant and volleyed up the side. It roared, Vergil rolled in the air to avoid being melted in place, and Leon blasted into the back of the thing where the scar tissue protected its passenger. The plagas emerged, rage filled and ready, it whipped in the air, Leon blasted it from close range and Trish shouted, "...FREEZE IT!"

Right.

Freeze time.

He flicked his wrist and the world stopped. Amused by such a gross abuse of power, he still unloaded a clip into the damn thing and blasted it to bits. His gaze caught sight of Trish in mid flourish. The word again - beautiful- made him stare. She was encased in a glorious halo of yellow fire, her form was still feminine somehow, even as it was clearly not human. He paused, reconsidered, and decided it was still her. Vergil had become something frightening, but Trish was softer, sweeter, smooth and gorgeous.

Amused at himself, Leon shook his wrist, time sped back up, and he leaped off the back of the falling el gigante. Trish caught him in midair, they swirled to safety and the thing took a heavy face plant onto the broken concrete beneath it. Trish held him steady as the world shook with the final fight of a dying beast and mused, "...you didn't trigger...why?"

Sighing, he admitted, "...I don't know how...I can't seem to do it by will."

She nodded and admitted, "...you're missing your weapon, your other weapon. First Dante, then we locate your final piece."

The gold shimmer of her form retreated, leaving her glowing with only her own light. She turned to call out to Lady and he told her, "...when this is done, I want to see if you glow when I'm inside you."

Trish froze. Her gaze swung around. He nodded, "Bad timing, yeah, we got that part...but there's something here, something that isn't-it's not typical. I want to explore that. Say no if you don't."

Trish said nothing.

He nodded, "Yeah. First Dante, then Lillith, then me...then _you. _You and me. God I feel about fifteen...because the waiting is almost as bad as the waking up in a world where I don't belong."

Trish murmured, "Are you sorry you're here?"

And he responded, "I can't be...I met you."

Lady's voice stole the moment, "I see the signs for the orphanage! Get up here, Dante the PG version, and let's do this."

Leon laughed. Trish was still staring at him. He had realized he was touching her waist and dropped his hand. They backed away and he shook his head, hurrying toward the battle they'd just finished.

She stood in the rain and yearned a little. She was slowly discovering all the things that came with humanity. Love, loss, regret, yearning...she wasn't sure how she felt about feeling anything at all, but she knew she wanted to feel every bit of it.

Dante had been shielding her from more than just anger and rage, he'd been unknowingly keeping her less human. With him missing, she was afraid for him, worried, and wanting somehow of the brother that had found his way in Dante's absence. She was becoming a woman...and desperately wishing she was one with the prodigal son i_nside of her._

In the distance, there was a shout and the loud sound of a struggle. Leon's voice echoed, "Don't!"

The sounds of battle had Trish running. She started to trigger and Leon caught her around the waist and held her, commanding, "Don't. Just wait."

The swirl of skirts and battle were incredible. Vergil fought like he'd finish his opponent without struggle. They clashed, the red vixen and the handsome man in blue. It was a beautiful dance.

She was swift and deadly. He was sharp and feral. When he swung back to cleave her head, Leon shot him twice in the back. It was such a betrayal that no one moved for a moment.

Finally, Trish shoved his arm up and out, shouting, "WHY!?"

From the ground, panting, the vixen in red gasped, "...Leon...long time, no see."

He said nothing. Morrison arrived over the rubble to snort, "...Ada."

Lady arched her brows, "This her? She's...skinny."

Vergil rose from the wall splattered in his blood and shouted, "You bastard! You coward! I knew you'd come at me from behind!"

Ada laughed, rising up and shaking herself, "He wasn't trying to kill you, fool, he was trying to save me. I'm Ada Wong. I can see you got my message."

Vergil halted. His brow furrowed as she mused, "...you move surprisingly well for a sack of flesh and bone."

Ada laughed, "...you charmer, you. I'm aflutter with flattery." She shifted and turned her gaze to Leon, "...you figure out who I am yet?"

He rolled his eyes, "I've known you how long? You ever really shown me that?"

Lady lifted her pistol on Ada and drawled, "Enough flirting. You wanna tell me where my good friend Dante is?"

Ada glanced at Leon and nodded. He sighed and answered, "...are you there with him?"

Ada nodded and sighed, leaning on the wall. "It's me, but I don't know it. Which sounds crazy, but I made sure I projected into my old self and found him. You've got three hours before I'm supposed to be in that goddamn garage to save you, Leon. If I don't get there...Mr. X makes sure you end up a smear on the wall, and all of this? It's for nothing."

Leon nodded. He turned to Morrison and mused, "How? How do I project far enough back to lead Dante? I need him to get to the gateway there by what used to be the gas station. How do I lead him without messing with history?"

Ada answered, "...that's where I come in. I need the Bangle of Time."

They all stared at her and she confessed, "...I need it to channel the only person who might have the answer."

Again, the silence was loud, until Vergil filled it, "...you want to speak to my mother."

Trish made a sound. Lady whistled. Leon shook his head, "...why?"

Ada, impressed with Vergil more than she'd like, told them, "Eva knew you'd need her. She knew we'd have to channel her so give Dante enough of himself to fight his way to the gateway. He thinks he's mortal. He thinks he's a man with no power. He'll die if we don't get him to use his powers. There's a city full of the undead between him and that gateway. He's terrified. He needed to remember. We need Eva to help him."

She put out her hand. Leon stared at her. She nodded and told him, "Yeah. I get it. I'm a big liar. You shouldn't trust me. But I've gotten you this far. Now's the worst time ever to start doubting that. Hurry...and hate me later."

He put his hand out. She covered the watch on his wrist with hers. The world narrowed down to their hands. Ada instructed, "Vergil."

To her surprise, he just...put his hand in. He told her, "...if you are lying, I'm going to tear you apart while you scream."

Ada laughed, voice sharp, "If I'm lying, we're all dead. You'll lose two brothers in one fell swoop. Dante dies and leaves his blood beside Leon's...imagine what that means for Lillith. She gets two of them...dead...in one place..and you racing to save them. Leon's negated by his own damn death back then...and you arrive in the nick of time to meet your death too. Boom boom boom. She's got all three of your blood...and the beginning of way worse than following the lead of some sack of skin like me."

Vergil said nothing.

Ada, nodding, invited, "Exactly. So...who wants to say high to Mommy?"

They were about to see how far he could push time. All they needed was a few moments with Eva to encourage her to channel her son. All Leon had to do, was give them a handful of moments.

In the distance, something roared.

Lady hefted her weapon and said, "...don't worry about that...that? That's what Trish and I _live _for. You leave the hard stuff to us, folks."

They started running toward the noise.

And Leon started trying to channel the woman whose face looked afraid to leave him.


End file.
